Q  00 -1916 


HERBERT 
ADAMS  . 
GIBBONS 


DT  31    .Gb  lyib  ^ 

Gibbons,  Herbert  Adams,  188( 


CLIP  HENRY 


LIBRARY  OF  PRINCETON 


THEOLOGICAL  SEMINARY 


THE 

NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/newmapofafrica1900gibb_0 


THE  ^  ^ 

NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 

{1900-1916) 

A   HISTORY   OF    EUROPEAN  COLONIAL 
EXPANSION  AND  COLONIAL 
DIPLOMACY 


BY 

HERBERT  ADAMS  GIBBONS 

Ph.D.,  F.R.Hist.S. 

author  of  "the  new  map  of  europe,"  "the  foundation  of 
the  ottoman  empire,"  "paris  reborn,"  etc. 


H.  BUCHER 


B.  P.  80 
LIBREVILLE 
GABON 


NEW  YORK 

THE  CENTURY  CO. 
1916 


■  I 


Copyright,  19  i6,  by 
THE  CENTURY  CO. 


Published,  November,  igi6 

IIDRARY  OF  PRINCETON 

JUL  2  9  2003 
THEOLOGICALSEMINARY 


Zo 

JAMES  GORDON  BENNETT 

whose  lifelong  interest  in 
what  before  his  day  was 

"The  Dark  Continent" 

HAS  been  an  important  factor 

IN  DISPELLING  THE 
DARKNESS. 


Semper  aliquid  noui  Africam  adferre. 


Greek  proverb,  quoted  by 
Pliny,  Hist.  Nat.  viii.  §42 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

I.   Great  Britain  in  the  Sudan  .       .  i 
II.    The  Islands  of  Africa    ...  31 

III.  The  Last  Years  of  the  Boer  War 

AND  the  Period  of  Reconstruction 

IN  South  Africa  ....  43 

IV.  The     Two     Independent  States: 

Liberia  and  Abyssinia  .        .       .  92 

V.    British  Policy  in  Somaliland         .  106 

VI.    The  Colonial  Ventures  of  Italy     .  115 

VII.    Algeria  and  Tunis:  the  Nucleus  of 

the  French  African  Empire        .  130 

VIII.    The  Belgians  in  the  Congo    .  -147 

IX.   The  First  German  Colony:  South- 
west Africa         .       .       .  .173 

X.    The  Heritage  of  Livingstone  and 

Rhodes  189 

XI.    The  British  in  East  Africa  and 

Uganda        .....  206 


viii  CONTENTS 

FACE 

XII.    The  Germans  in  East  Africa  .       .  228 

XIII.  The  Problem  of  the  Portuguese 

Colonies  244 

XIV.  The  British  in  West  Africa  .       .  276 

XV.    The  Germans  in  West  Africa.       .  299 

XVI.    The  French  in  West  Africa  and  the 

Sahara  .       .       .      •        .  .312 

XVII.    French  Penetration  into  Central 

Africa  335 

XVIII.    European  Rivalry  in  Morocco  before 

Algeciras  355 

XIX.    France  Gets  Morocco    .       .       .  374 

XX.    Egypt  under  the  Last  of  the  Khe- 
dives  391 

XXI.   Egypt  Becomes  a  British  Protecto- 
rate    .       .       .       .       .  .421 

^  XXII.   The  Creation  of  the  South  African 

Union        .....  441 

XXIII.  The  Rebellion  in  South  Africa  and 

ITS  Aftermath      ....  454 

XXIV.  The    Conquest    of    the  German 

Colonies  470 


CONTENTS  ix 

PAGE 

XXV.    African  Problems  for  the  Peace 

Conference  481 

Index  493 

MAPS 

FACING  PAGE 

I.    Africa  at  the  Outbreak  of  the 

War       .....  Title-page 

II.   Africa  about  1850    .       .       .  -32 

III.  Africa  in  1902         .       .       .  .64 

IV.  The  Mediterranean  Coast  of  Africa  128 

V.  Sketch  Map  Showing  the  German- 

French  Boundaries  in  1912  .       .  360 

VI.    The  South  African  Commonwealth  448 


FOREWORD 


WHEN  The  New  Map  of  Europe  was  written, 
at  the  beginning  of  the  war,  I  had  to 
forego  dealing  in  a  comprehensive  way 
with  colonial  questions.  Only  the  facts  concerning 
European  expansion  in  Africa  that  seemed  to  have 
direct  bearing  upon  the  diplomatic  history  of  the 
ten  years  preceding  August  i,  19 14  could  be  in- 
cluded. But  what  has  happened — and  what  has 
not  happened — in  Africa  during  the  past  two  years 
revealed  to  me  the  necessity  of  reviewing  the  fifteen 
years  of  colonial  development,  effort  and  rivalry 
of  European  states  in  Africa,  if  I  wanted  to  have  a 
clear  understanding  of  the  forces  that  had  driven 
Europe  to  war,  of  the  issues  that  the  war  was  bring- 
ing into  clear  light,  and  of  the  problems  that  would 
confront  the  Peace  Conference. 

The  facts  for  a  book  on  European  colonization  in 
Africa  I  had  been  gathering  for  years.  But  I  had 
no  idea  until  now  how  important  these  facts  were, 
and  how  essential  a  knowledge  of  them  was  to  the 
student  of  contemporary  European  history.  This 
book  has  been  written  not  at  all  in  the  way  originally 
planned,  but  with  the  illumination  that  has  come 
through  more  than  two  years  of  living  in  the  midst 
of  the  great  conflict  and  writing  daily  upon  its 

xi 


xii 


FOREWORD 


various  phases.  However  radically  and  vehemently 
readers  may  differ  from  interpretations  and  conclu- 
sions, I  hope  none  will  feel  it  a  loss  of  time  to  go 
with  me  through  these  pages  that  narrate  the  evolu- 
tion of  Africa  from  the  Boer  War  to  the  completion 
of  the  conquest  of  the  last  German  colony  by  General 
Smuts  and  the  combined  British,  Belgian,  and  Portu- 
guese armies  in  the  autimm  of  191 6. 

I  trust  that  none  will  think  lightly  of  my  work 
because  it  is  not  accompanied  by  footnotes  and  a 
bibliography.  Primary  sources  are  the  govern- 
mental "papers, "  containing  texts  of  treaties,  official 
correspondence  and  reports,  consular  reports,  parlia- 
mentary speeches  and  debates;  bulletins  and  reports 
of  proceedings  of  chambers  of  commerce  and  other 
organizations  interested  in  African  colonization  for 
economic,  financial,  political,  scientific,  and  socio- 
logical reasons;  and,  occasionally,  newspaper  compte- 
rendus  of  interviews  and  speeches.  The  books  I 
have  consulted  are  legion.  The  more  important 
ones  can  be  found  in  the  bibliographical  lists  after 
each  colony  in  the  Statesman'' s  Year  Book.  To  the 
summaries  of  events  from  year  to  year  in  the  London 
Annual  Register,  I  gratefully  acknowledge  constant 
indebtedness.  For  the  first  half  of  my  period,  these 
illuminating  annals  were  written  by  Mr.  H.  Whates. 
Statistics  are  taken  from  the  Statesman's  Year  Book; 
French,  German,  Belgian,  and  Italian  publications 
that  come  under  the  head  of  primary  sources  men- 
tioned above;  Augustin  Bernard's  Le  Maroc,  Angel 
Marvaud's  Le  Portugal  et  ses  colonies,  and  A.  P. 
Calvert's  German  African  Empire.    I  have  made 


FOREWORD 


Xlll 


use  also  of  my  own  correspondence  to  the  New  York 
Herald  and  the  Philadelphia  Evening  Telegraph. 

I  want  to  express  my  keen  appreciation  of  the 
hospitaHty  and  precious  help  I  received  during  a 
visit  to  Africa  in  war  time  from  H.  H.  Hussein  Ka- 
mil,  G.C.B.,  Sultan  of  Egypt;  General  Sir  Reginald 
Wingate,  G.C.B.,  G.C.V.O.,  etc.,  Governor- General 
of  the  Sudan;  Sir  Henry  McMahon,  G.V.C.O., 
K.C.I. E.,  etc.,  H.  M.'s  High  Commissioner  for 
Egypt;  General  Sir  John  Maxwell,  K.C.B.,K.C.M.G., 
etc..  Commanding  the  British  Army  in  Egypt; 
Hussein  Rushdi  Pasha,  Prime  Minister  of  Egypt; 
Col.  E.  E.  Barnard  Pasha,  C.M.G.,  Financial 
Secretary  of  the  Sudan;  Ronald  Storrs,  Esq.,  Oriental 
Secretary  to  the  British  Agency;  Arakel  Nubar  Bey, 
French  Secretary  to  H.  H.  the  Sultan;  Major  G.  B. 
Symes,  D.S.O.,  Private  Secretary  to  H.  E.  the 
Governor-General  of  the  Sudan;  Gerald  Delany, 
Esq.,  Renter's  Manager  at  Cairo;  J.  Edgar,  Esq., 
sometime  Professor  in  Cape  To\\ti  University  and 
later  Editor  of  the  Johannesburg  Star;  and  Walter 
Harris,  Esq.,  of  Tangier,  Times  Correspondent  in 
Morocco.  Mr.  Edgar  and  Mr.  Harris  were  good 
enough  to  submit  to  the  imposition  of  lengthy 
questionnaires  on  South  African  and  Moroccan 
history,  in  which  they  have  played  an  active  and 
important  r61e.  Many  a  glimpse  into  the  inside 
history  of  Egypt  did  I  get  from  Artin  Pasha,  last  of 
the  "elder  statesmen"  of  Egypt,  who  went  over 
with  me  the  books  of  Lord  Cromer,  Lord  Milner, 
and  Mr.  Dicey,  and  gave  me  a  copy  of  his  own  work 
on  the  Sudan. 


xiv 


FOREWORD 


To  Mr.  James  Gordon  Bennett  and  Mr.  Rodman 
Wanamaker  I  owe  the  privilege  of  a  visit  to  Africa 
in  the  early  months  of  191 6,  and  to  Boghos  Nubar 
Pasha  continuous  and  hearty  encouragement  to 
undertake  work  in  a  field  where  his  knowledge  and 
life-long  experience  make  that  encouragement  worth 
more  than  can  be  estimated. 

Herbert  Adams  Gibbons 


Villa  El  Farn,  rue  des  Dunes 
HouLGATE,  Calvados,  Normandy. 
October,  1916. 


THE 

NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


\ 


The  New  Map  of  Africa 


CHAPTER  I 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 
FTER  the  failure  of  the  Khartum  Relief  Expedi- 


tion and  the  death  of  General  Gordon,  the 


British  Government  ordered  Egypt  and  the 
British  army  to  drop  the  Sudan.  The  whole  Gordon 
and  Sudan  literature,  which  requires  a  separate  bibli- 
ography and  is  filled  with  sentimentalism,  misrepre- 
sentations, and  party  prejudices,  is  the  historical 
monument  and  record  of  the  activity  of  Englishmen 
at  home  and  their  interest  in  the  problem  of  the  Sudan 
during  the  decade  that  followed  the  shameful  fiasco  of 
1884.  The  Gordon  legend  alone  was  in  the  mind  of 
the  Britisher  who  never  left  his  tight  little  island, 
and  who  considered  that  fact  a  kind  of  virtue.  The 
Mahdi  reigned  supreme  in  the  Sudan,  and  after  his 
death,  his  successor,  the  Khalifa,  continued  to  exter- 
minate the  tribes  of  the  upper  tributaries  of  the  Nile. 
For  all  British  Cabinets  and  the  British  public  seemed 
to  care,  the  dervishes  were  welcome  to  keep  the 
Sudan,  and  the  early  eighties  were  "past  history." 


I 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


But  some  Englishmen  did  care  and  did  not  forget. 
In  fact,  there  was  never  a  moment  that  the  thought  of 
the  eventual  reconquest  of  the  Sudan  and  of  the  re- 
trieving of  the  honor  of  British  arms  was  not  before 
them.  They  had  the  vision.  They  lived  with  eyes 
fixed  on  the  goal.  The  uninitiable  never  look  back 
of  events  to  their  causes.  To  them  whatever  of 
^^ortune  through  achievement  falls  to  the  other 
fellow  is  "luck."  They  beHeve  that  Lord  Cromer 
blundered  to  fame  through  twenty-five  years  of  hit 
and  miss  in  Egypt,  and  that  Lord  Kitchener  was 
"made"  by  the  battle  of  Omdurman,  "after  all,  you 
know,  an  easy  butchery  of  crazy  fanatics  who  had 
no  chance  at  all  against  his  superior  weapons. " 

The  battle  of  Omdurman  on  September  2,  1898, 
which  made  possible  the  reconquest  and  redemption 
of  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan  and  the  foundation  of 
its  present  splendid  government,  was  the  culminat- 
ing event  of  more  than  ten  years  of  herculean  ef- 
fort on  the  part  of  a  handful  of  men  whose 
enthusiasm  was  fortunately  matched  by  their  fore- 
sight, patience,  and  ability.  The  victory  won  at 
Omdurman  was  the  beginning  of  a  new  era  for  the 
British  Empire  in  Africa  and  throughout  the  world. 
History  will  give  to  those  who  worked  for  it  and 
those  who  won  it  credit  for  far  more  than  the 
rehabilitation  of  the  Sudan. 

British  colonial  administrators  have  succeeded  in 
building  an  empire  in  spite  of,  rather  than  with  the 
help  of,  their  Government  and  the  great  mass  of  their 
fellow-countrymen.  Problems  confronting  them  in 
their  field  of  action  have  never  been  more  difficult 

2 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


than  the  problem  of  getting  and  keeping  support 
from  home.  London  is  the  bete  noire  of  the  Enghsh 
official  overseas.  Cablegrams  from  home  cause  more 
trouble  than  native  uprisings.  In  regard  to  foreign 
policy,  Conservative  and  Liberal  Cabinets  are  very 
much  the  same.  They  are  guided  by  the  fears  and 
the  hopes  of  General  Elections,  and  they  hate  like 
poison : 

1.  To  spend  the  British  taxpayer's  money  over- 
seas. 

2.  To  sanction  any  policy  that  is  likely  to  cause 
fighting  in  which  British  troops  must  be  engaged. 

3.  To  offend  the  nonconformist  conscience. 

Colonial  administrators  who  keep  in  mind  con- 
stantly these  three  points,  and  who  plan  to  get  result? 
without  coming  into  conflict  with  the  Government  on 
any  one  of  them,  succeed  in  making  for  themselves 
great  careers,  and  gain  honors,  if  not  peace  of  mind. 
Those  who  do  not  keep  these  points  in  mind  never  get 
very  far  in  a  colonial  career. 

This  is  why  the  reconqucst  of  the  Sudan  needed  a 
decade  of  preparation.  There  was  never  any  hope 
at  all  of  convincing  the  British  public  of  the  necessity 
of  pouring  out  blood  and  treasure  to  get  back  to 
Khartum.  Unwillingness  to  pay  the  price  had  been 
the  cause  of  the  debdcle  of  1884.  The  only  other 
possible  way  of  accomplishing  what  they  had  in 
mind  was  to  put  Egypt  upon  a  sound  financial  basis, 
and  to  recreate  an  Egyptian  army  that  knew  how 
to  fight  and  that  would  fight.  The  invasion  of 
the  Sudan  and  the  winning  of  the  battle  of  Omdur- 
man  was  possible  only  because  Lord  Cromer  made 

3 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Egypt's  revenues  exceed  her  expenditures  and  be- 
cause Lord  Kitchener  got  an  Egyptian  army  into 
good  fighting  shape.  When  this  was  accompHshed 
— and  not  before  then — it  could  be  pointed  out 
to  London  that  Egypt  could  contribute  both  in 
men  and  money  very  substantially  to  an  expedition 
against  the  Khalifa.  There  had  to  be  an  appeal 
also  to  public  opinion  in  England  and  to  the 
nonconformist  conscience.  So  for  years  one  can 
read  in  Lord  Cromer's  annual  reports  the  skilfully 
introduced  and  skilfully  emphasized  leitmotiv  of 
the  necessity  to  Egypt  of  the  reclamation  of  the 
Sudan.  Never  could  there  be  security  in  Upper 
Egypt  until  the  dervishes  were  crushed.  Never 
would  irrigation  projects  on  a  large  scale  be  justi- 
fiable or  possible  until  the  headwater's  of  the  Nile 
were  under  Anglo-Egyptian  control.  Never  would 
the  African  slave  traffic  be  stopped  until  the  region 
from  the  equator  to  Wady  Haifa  was  policed  by 
Europeans.  Common  humanity  and  moral  re- 
sponsibility also  demanded  the  reconquest  of  the 
Sudan.  For  the  native  population  was  rapidly  dying 
out  everywhere  because  of  the  dervish  cruelties  and 
mismanagement.  Last  of  all,  from  the  standpoint 
of  European  prestige,  the  Italian  defeat  at  Adowa 
must  be  counteracted. 

Since  Egyptian  money  and  Egyptian  lives  were 
largely  instrumental  in  the  reconquest  of  the  Sudan, 
and  since  the  legal  rights  to  the  territories  it  would 
comprise  rested  wholly  upon  those  of  the  Ottoman 
Empire  and  the  Egyptian  Khedives,  it  was  impos- 
sible— though  it  would  have  been  desirable — to 

4 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


establish  an  English  colony  or  a  distinct  Protectorate 
under  direct  British  control.  Then,  too,  the  Sudan 
was  going  to  look  for  an  indeterminable  period  to  the 
Egyptian  army  and  the  Egj'ptian  budget  for  soldiers 
and  money  to  hold,  to  rehabilitate,  and  to  develop 
the  vast  regions  which  Mahdiism  had  so  cruelly 
oppressed  and  mined.  And  was  not  the  principal 
reason  for  reconquest  the  political  security  and  the 
economic  advantage  to  Egypt  through  possessing 
the  headwaters  of  the  Nile?  The  problem  was 
exceedingly  delicate,  o^^ing  to  Great  Britain's  an- 
omalous position  in  Eg>'pt,  both  from  the  inter- 
national and  the  Ottoman  point  of  view. 

A  convention  signed  at  Cairo  on  January  19,  1899, 
between  the  British  and  Eg^^ptian  Governments, 
stated  that  the  territory  south  of  the  twenty-second 
parallel  of  latitude  was  to  be  administered  by  a 
Governor-General,  appointed  by  Egypt  with  the 
assent  of  Great  Britain.  The  British  and  Egyptian 
flags  were  to  be  used  together.  No  duties  were  to 
be  levied  on  imports  from  Eg^'pt,  and  duties  on  im- 
ports from  other  countries,  by  way  of  the  Red  Sea, 
were  not  to  exceed  the  'Egyptian  tariffs.  As  long 
as  it  should  be  necessary,  Egypt  was  to  make  good 
the  deficit  in  the  Sudan  budget.  But  the  money 
invested  in  the  Sudan  by  Egypt  would  be  considered 
a  loan,  upon  which  interest  would  be  paid  as  soon  as 
possible.  A  portion  of  the  Egyptian  army  should 
serve  in  the  Sudan,  under  the  command  of  the 
Governor-General,  himself  an  officer  of  the  Eg>'ptian 
army  with  the  rank  of  Sirdar.  So  long  as  the  na- 
tions who  enjoyed  the  privileges  of  a  capitulatory 

5 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


regime  in  Egypt  did  not  demand  the  extension  of  the 
capitulations  to  the  Sudan,  and  so  long  as  Egypt 
remained  under  effective  British  control,  such  an 
arrangement,  paradoxical  as  it  seemed,  was  workable. 
It  has  worked  out  all  right.  But  it  is  important  to 
note  that  the  exact  status  of  the  Sudan,  both  from 
the  international  and  the  Egyptian  point  of  view,  has 
not  yet  been  determined.  It  will  come  up  for  settle- 
ment in  the  Peace  Conference,  when  the  affairs  of 
the  Ottoman  Empire  are  liquidated,  and  international 
sanction  is  asked  for  the  British  Protectorate  pro- 
claimed over  Egypt  since  the  opening  of  the  European 
War.^ 

Once  the  Sudan  was  reconquered,  Cromer  and 
Kitchener  still  held  to  the  policy  of  "sound  financial 
basis"  that  had  made  the  conquest  possible.  For 
they  knew  that  the  Home  Government  would  take 
little  interest  in,  and  do  nothing  for,  the  Anglo- 
Egyptian  Sudan  unless  it  was  demonstrated  to  them 
that  the  country  coidd  pay  its  way.  Immediate  use 
could  be  made  of  almost  unlimited  sums  of  money, 
and  the  temptation  was  great  to  enter  upon  and  urge 
London  and  Cairo  to  cooperate  in  ambitious  develop- 
ment schemes.  Cromer  and  Kitchener  were  in 
complete  accord  in  not  falling  into  this  trap,  and 
when  Kitchener  was  suddenly  called  away  to  South 
Africa,  Lord  Cromer  was  fortunate  in  finding  in  his 
successor.  Sir  Reginald  Wingate,  an  administrator 
fully  aware  of  the  danger  of  grandiose  schemes  of 
rehabilitation  and  rapid  development.  The  initial 
financial  policy  laid  down  by  Lord  Cromer  in  his 

'  For  the  Egyptian  point  of  view,  see  pp.  42 1-440. 

6 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


address  to  the  Sudanese  chiefs  at  Khartum  in  Decem- 
ber, 1900,  to  the  efifect  that  taxes  were  not  to  be  made 
burdensome,  even  if  communications  and  develop- 
ments had  to  wait,  has  been  faithfully  and  consist- 
ently carried  out.  To  it  more  than  to  anything  else 
is  due  the  marvelous  success  of  the  Sudan  admin- 
istration. For  the  Sudanese  have  had  from  the 
beginning  the  contrast  of  the  equitable  taxation  of 
the  British  with  that  which  ground  them  down  and 
ruined  them  under  the  Mahdi  and  the  Khalifa:  and 
the  British  Government  has  not  been  wearied  and  pre- 
judiced against  the  Sudan  by  unreasonable  demands 
for  financial  support. 

The  cost  of  the  reconquest  was  L.E.  2,412,000,^ 
of  which  the  British  Government  paid  L.E.  780,000. 
More  money  had,  of  course,  to  be  invested  in  rail- 
ways, in  river  transport,  and  in  irrigation.  The  paci- 
fication of  the  country  and  the  rehabilitation  of  its 
inhabitants  depended  upon  means  of  transportation 
and  the  cultivation  of  the  land.  Ever^^thing  had 
been  destroyed  or  had  fallen  into  decay  during  the 
years  of  anarchy :  so  all  kinds  of  public  works  needed 
a  substantial  budget.  Popular  education  had  to  be 
thought  of,  and  the  expenses  of  the  civil  administra- 
tion and  a  considerable  military  establishment  pro- 
vided for.  But  though  the  financial  task  looked  so 
formidable  as  to  be  almost  hopeless,  it  was  success- 
fully grappled  with,  and  the  country  saved  from  con- 
cession hunters  and  insolvency  by  the  adoption  and 
maintenance  of  the  conservative  policy  of  "go  slow 
and  pay  as  you  go." 

'  L.E.  =Egyf>tian  pound,  approximately  five  dollars. 

7 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


In  1903,  the  Egj'ptian  Cabinet  authorized  an  ad- 
vance to  the  Sudan  for  railway  construction  of 
L.E.  1,770,000  to  spread  over  four  years.  This  was 
a  sound  financial  investment.  For  it  was  soon  de- 
monstrated that  the  increased  revenue  through  the 
development  of  transportation  faciHties  would  cut 
down  Eg^^pt's  contribution  to  the  annual  deficit  more 
than  the  interest  on  this  money.  In  1906,  the  Su- 
dan Railway  administration  yielded  a  net  profit  of 
L.E.  52,000,'  and  in  1907  the  Sudan  Government  was 
able  to  pay  to  Egypt,  L.E.  45,000  interest  on  part  of 
the  L.E.  3,000,000  advanced  by  Egypt  for  capital 
expenditures  up  to  the  end  of  1906.  The  Sudan 
Government  declared  that  it  was  now  in  a  position 
to  assist  the  development  of  public  works  in  the 
Sudan.  L.E.  100,000  was  set  aside  for  public  works 
in  1908  and  L.E.  285,000  for  the  purchase  of  rails  for 
the  Atbara-Khartum  Railway.  From  January  i,  1908, 
the  Sudan  began  to  pay  interest  at  3  per  cent,  on 
L.E.  1,500,000  of  the  debt  to  Eg^^pt.  The  deficit  in 
revenue  for  1908  was  only  L.E.  47,000,  and  in  1909  the 

'  Over  and  over  again  in  Africa  the  tremendous  financial  advantage 
to  a  country  accruing  from  state  ownership  of  public  utilities  is 
demonstrated.  The  Sudan,  like  South  Africa,  Egypt,  and  other 
countries,  gets  a  good  share  of  its  surplus  revenue  from  railway  profits 
— a  surplus  that  comes  even  though  hundreds  of  miles  of  line  are 
built  and  operated  at  a  loss  for  political  reasons  or  for  the  ultimate 
benefit  of  the  people.  One  striking  illustration  of  what  the  Sudan 
has  gained  from  keeping  its  transportation  out  of  the  hands  of  con- 
cession hunters  is  found  in  the  little  Khartum-Omdurman  tram, 
which  plies  from  Khartum  to  the  ferry  leading  to  Omdurman.  This 
tram  line,  carrying  wholly  natives,  was  begged  for  often  at  the 
beginning  by  private  groups.  The  Government  kept  it,  and  to-day 
it  brings  a  net  profit  of  fifty  thousand  pounds  per  annum  to  the 
treasury. 

8 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


annual  subvention  from  the  Egyptian  Treasury  was 
reduced  by  another  L.E.  10,000.  This  encouraged 
Egypt  to  advance  L.E.  380,000  for  railway  extension 
and  improvement,  and  the  completion  of  Port  Sudan 
town  and  harbor.  In  1910,  Sir  Reginald  Wingate 
was  able  to  report  that  the  entire  Civil  Administra- 
tion was  paying  its  way  and  that  the  only  deficit 
was  on  the  military  budget.  As  more  land  came 
under  cultivation,  trade  would  increase  and  the 
deficit  disappear.  Three  years  later  there  was  a 
surplus  of  L.E.  40,000.    The  Sudan  had  made  good. 

Exports  increased  thirty  per  cent,  in  191 1,  owing  to 
the  development  of  the  cotton  industry.  In  1 91 2, 
the  creation  of  Port  Sudan  and  the  Hnking  of  the  Red 
Sea  with  the  Nile  by  railway  made  possible  export 
without  prohibitive  transportation  charges.  Cotton, 
cattle,  and  sheep  progressed  rapidly.  In  1913,  the 
trade  output  jumped  again,  owing  to  the  extension  of 
the  railway  to  El  Obeid.  Great  Britain  was  supply- 
ing thirty-nine  per  cent,  of  ihe  imports,  and  took 
twenty  per  cent,  of  the  exports. 

It  is  no  surprise,  then,  that  the  British  Parliament 
showed  itself  willing  to  guarantee  the  interest  on  a 
loan  of  £3,000,000  for  cotton  cultivation  in  the  Sudan. 
The  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer  explained  that  this 
outlay,  in  irrigation  and  railway  extension,  would 
develop  the  cultivation  of  cotton  of  the  finest  quality, 
greatly  needed  by  England  for  the  manufacture  of 
her  unique  grades  of  cotton  goods. 

A  few  months  ago,  I  sat  in  the  office  of  the  Finan- 
cial Secretary  at  Khartum.  Colonel  Bernard  is  a 
type  of  officer  one  finds  only  in  the  British  army.  If 

9 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 

he  were  a  Frenchman,  he  would  never  have  left  Paris. 
If  he  were  an  American,  he  would  be  one  of  our 
captains  of  industry,  with  a  yacht  and  a  summer 
home  at  Newport  or  Bar  Harbor,  and  wondering 
how  he  could  spend  his  money.  We  occasionally  get 
in  our  army  and  navy  men  with  a  genius  for  business : 
but  they  do  not  stay.  It  may  be  partly  due  to  the 
fact  that  until  the  Spanish  War  there  were  no  tasks 
to  challenge  this  type  of  man.  But  it  is  mostly  due 
to  the  entire  difference  in  our  social  system  from  that 
of  Great  Britain.  The  Colonial  Empire  under  the 
British  flag  has  been  built  by  men  who  have  gone 
into  Government  service  for  reasons  of  caste.  Among 
them  there  has  naturally  been  a  large  number,  like 
Colonel  Bernard,  with  marked  aptitude  for  business. 
In  any  other  country  most  of  these  men  would  have 
gone  into  business.  In  England  they  never  dream 
of  such  a  thing.  In  order  to  enjoy  the  privileges 
of  caste,  young  men  of  good  families  are  willing  to 
leave  home  and  friends,  to  live  separated  from  their 
own  children,  and  to  spend  the  thirty  to  forty  best 
years  of  their  life  in  exile.  They  are  content  with  an 
occasional  visit  to  England  and  with  little  or  no 
money,  if  only  they  preserve  their  caste.  This  is 
the  secret  of  Great  Britain's  world  empire.  The 
moment  the  Englishman  of  the  upper  classes  con- 
siders business  as  honorable  a  vocation  as  Govern- 
ment service,  Britain's  Colonial  Empire  will  resemble 
France's  or  Germany's — or  will  collapse  altogether. 
All  this  passed  through  my  head  as  I  listened  to 
Colonel  Bernard  explaining,  budget  estimates  before 
him,  the  financial  policy  of  the  Sudan,  with  all  the 

10 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


enthusiasm  and  keenness  and  understanding  of  an 
American  trying  to  attract  capital  to  his  latest 
enterprise. 

Without  the  railway  across  the  desert  from  Wady 
Haifa  to  Atbara,  Kitchener's  task  against  the  der- 
vishes would  have  been  tenfold  more  difficult,  and  the 
victory  of  doubtful  permanent  value.  As  the  in- 
vaders proceeded  to  Khartum,  it  was  essential  to  lay 
ties  and  rails  with  unflagging  haste.  Only  did  the 
re-occupation  seem  a  reality  and  worth  while  when 
through  railway  service  was  established  from  Khar- 
tum to  Wady  Haifa.  As  the  political  success  of  the 
reconquest  was  wholly  dependent  upon  its  proving 
a  financial  success,  and  as  serious  economic  develop- 
ment was  out  of  the  question  so  long  as  the  route 
through  Egypt  was  the  only  exit  from  the  country, 
the  first  task  of  the  Government  was  to  connect 
the  Nile  with  the  Red  Sea  by  railway.  In  1902, 
Lord  Cromer  pointed  this  out  in  his  annual  report, 
and  the  following  year  he  succeeded  in  getting  the 
Egyptian  Government  to  furnish  the  money,  as  we 
have  seen  above.  After  untold  difficulties  with 
labor,  and  the  construction  of  a  bridge  over  the 
Atbara  River,  the  junction  was  completed  in  1907. 
Suakim  was  abandoned  as  the  terminus  on  the  Red 
Sea,  and  a  harbor  built  some  miles  farther  north  at 
a  hamlet  which  was  renamed  Port  Sudan.  The 
Atbara  railway  shops  were  increased  and  improved, 
and  the  Sudan  Government  itself  bore  part  of  the  ex- 
pense of  remaking  the  line  from  Khartum  to  Atbara. 
In  1908,  telegraphic  communication  was  completed 
with  Gondokoro,  on  the  White  Nile,  two  weeks  by 

II 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


steamer  south  of  Kliartum.  The  Blue  Nile  was 
bridged  at  Khartum  for  a  railway  into  the  Gezira 
district  between  the  two  rivers.  El  Obeid,  the  ter- 
minus of  this  southern  railway  extension,  was 
reached  in  191 3. 

A  glance  at  the  map  is  necessary  to  realize  what  a 
tremendous  territory  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan 
covers  and  how  impossible  it  is  for  the  administra- 
tors of  the  country  to  pacify  and  civilize  it  com- 
pletely, much  less  to  develop  its  resources,  until  more 
railways  are  built,  reaching  into  the  heart  of  all  the 
different  provinces. 

The  greatest  appeal  to  the  imagination  of  the  Brit- 
ish public  in  connection  with  the  reconquest  of  the 
Sudan  was  the  fulfilment  of  the  task  for  which  it  was 
generally  believed  that  Gordon  had  given  his  life, 
the  suppression  of  the  slave  trade.  Although  the 
difficulty  of  this  task  was  enormous,  insurmountable 
even,  in  so  far  as  slavery  within  the  tribes  was  con- 
cerned, Lord  Cromer  felt  it  incumbent  to  mention  in 
his  report  almost  every  year  the  progress  of  the  slave 
suppression  crusade.  In  1903,  he  confessed  his  dis- 
appointment that  the  slave  trade  was  not  extinct ;  in 
1904,  he  announced  a  marked  decrease  in  the  slave 
trade;  in  1905,  he  said  that  it  was  difficult  to  check 
slave  traffic  in  the  Kordofan  province;  in  1906,  he  be- 
lieved that  there  would  still  be  great  difficulty  in  sup- 
pressing the  slave  trade;  and  in  1907  he  attributed 
most  of  the  trouble  in  Kordofan  to  the  anti-slavery 
policy  to  which  the  Government  was  committed.  The 
road  to  abolition,  he  remarked  in  his  last  report,  "is 
a  very  long  road,  and  it  will  take  years  to  get  to  the 

12 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


end  of  it."  Improved  communications,  however, 
and  the  advance  of  colonial  enterprise  in  British, 
German,  Belgian,  and  French  equatorial  colonies, 
helped  to  put  a  stop  to  long-distance  slave-nmning. 
The  area  of  operations  of  slave  merchants  has  been 
gradually  circumscribed  until  in  19 14  the  official  re- 
port announced  that  slave  traffic  was  "almost  im- 
possible" in  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan. 

British  officials  who  have  to  deal  with  slavery  at 
close  range,  however,  especially  the  judges,  consider 
this  statement  a  bit  too  optimistic.  Slave  traffic 
can  be  detected  and  frequently  punished,  when  it  is 
carried  on  from  district  to  district.  But  within 
tribal  limits,  especially  if  the  tribes  be  Moslem,  even 
where  moral  certainty  of  definite  cases  of  slavery 
exists,  legal  evidence  is  hard  to  obtain.  Where 
slavery  is  as  established  an  institution  as  polygamy, 
decrees  bind  only  those  who  dare  or  who  want  to  take 
advantage  of  them.  There  are  cases  without  number, 
also,  where  the  slaves  arc  ignorant  of  the  abolition 
decree,  and  even  if  it  were  explained  to  them,  they 
would  not  know  what  it  meant. '    Education  is  a 

'  One  who  has  not  traveled  out  of  the  beaten  track  has  no 
more  conception  of  the  ignorance  of  people  in  uncivilized  countries 
than  the  people  of  uncivilized  countries  have  of  our  institutions.  A 
word  is  meaningless — unless  you  can  grasp  the  idea  the  word  stands 
for.  At  the  time  of  the  proclamation  of  the  Constitution  in  Turkey, 
I  was  traveling  in  Asia  Minor.  Everyone,  Moslem  and  Christian 
alike,  was  enthusiastic  about  the  new  liberty.  The  Turkish  word 
for  liberty  is  huriet.  Villagers  who  were  celebrating  the  huriet  looked 
at  some  photographs  we  had.  One  was  a  picture  of  an  American 
missionary  school  building  in  Tarsus.  They  asked,  pointing  to  the 
building,  "Is  this  house  the  huriet  we  arc  so  happy  about?  How 
wonderful!"    And  yet,  colonial  administrators  are  continually 

13 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


necessary  prerequisite  to  the  functioning  and  en- 
joying of  Occidental  social  and  political  institutions. 
Enthusiasts  and  sentimentalists  forget  the  fact  that 
our  ancestors  did  not  evolve,  support,  and  use  these 
institutions  until  we  conceived  and  desired  them  as  a 
result  of  education. 

Lord  Ivitchener's  first  visit  to  the  Sudan  after  the 
Boer  War  was  to  open  Gordon  College  in  1902,  when 
he  was  on  his  way  to  India.  In  his  address  he  as- 
serted his  entire  sympathy  with  the  objects  of  the 
college  on  the  lines  originally  conceived,  although  he 
admitted  the  necessity  of  using  public  funds  for  the 
advancement  of  primary  teaching.  He  expressed  the 
hope  that  he  would  be  able  to  return  in  five  years  and 
find  that  higher  education  was  being  given  at  Gordon 
College. '  Although  Gordon  College  is  not  as  yet  in  a 
position  to  offer  courses  such  as  are  given  in  Robert 
College  at  Constantinople,  the  Syrian  Protestant 
College  at  Beirut,  and  several  Indian  and  Chinese 
universities,  it  is  far  ahead  of  any  institution  of 

being  taken  to  task  by  the  people  at  home  because  a  stroke  of  the 
pen  has  not  immediately  brought  home  to  the  natives  imder  their 
charge  "all  the  benefits  of  our  civilization." 

'  Lord  Kitchener  did  not  return  in  five  years,  as  he  hoped.  But  he 
visited  Khartum  again  in  1910,  and  was  promising  himself  a  long 
tour,  after  he  went  back  to  Cairo  as  H.  AI.'s  Agent  and  Consul-Gcn- 
eral,  when  the  present  war  broke  out.  Sir  Reginald  Wingate,  writing 
to  me  from  Khartum  in  June,  said :  "  .  .  .  I  think  it  fell  to  few  to  get 
to  know  him  as  intimately  as  I  did.  Under  his  cold  exterior  beat  a 
very  warm  and  kind  heart,  but  he  was  most  successful  in  keeping 
this  from  the  world.  To  this  country  he  is  a  great  loss,  for  I  know 
his  heart  was  in  it,  and  he  was  almost  worshiped  by  the  people,  from 
whom  I  have  had  hundreds  of  telegrams  and  letters  of  condolence 
and  sympathy." 

14 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


higher  learning  in  Africa  or  Asia  in  the  work  of  its 
research  laboratories  and  in  the  cooperation  it  gives 
to  the  Government  for  the  development  of  the 
resources  of  the  country,  the  betterment  of  public 
health,  and  ethnological  investigation. 

Gordon  College  is  a  State  institution,  which  works 
with  and  for  the  Government.  I  wish  it  were  pos- 
sible to  speak  here  of  the  wonderful  things  that  are 
being  done  by  Dr.  Chalmers  and  others  in  the  Well- 
come Research  Laboratories.  It  is  a  revelation  of 
the  ability  and  the  devotion  of  the  scientists  to  whom 
the  manifold  problems  of  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan 
have  been  a  challenge  sufficiently  engrossing  to  keep 
them  far  from  the  great  world  and  yet  develop  their 
genius  so  strikingly  that  the  great  world's  attention 
is  continually  called  to  what  they  are  doing  and  dis- 
covering. But  it  is  more  than  that.  A  visit  to 
Gordon  College  and  the  Wellcome  Laboratories  opens 
one's  eyes  to  the  methods  that  are  being  pursued  by 
Sir  Reginald  Wingate  and  his  associates,  and  the  goal 
they  have  before  them.  There  is  no  highly  civilized 
country  in  the  world  where  more  constant  attention 
is  being  paid  to  means  of  developing  resources  and 
better  ability  being  invested  in  the  study  of  those 
means  than  in  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan. 

In  addition  to  the  research  work  of  Gordon  College, 
the  Department  of  Education  has  established  a  Cen- 
tral Research  Farm  at  Khartum  North.  Here  field 
experiments  in  growing  what  the  Sudan  might  pro- 
duce are  tried  out,  and  practical  work  is  done  in  horti- 
culture and  forestry.  At  Gordon  College  and  in  three 
other  cities,  industrial  workshops  teach  boys  trades. 

15 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  criticism  has  frequently  been  made  against  the 
British  administration  in  the  Sudan  as  in  Egypt  that 
educational  facilities  are  not  as  fully  extended  as  they 
ought  to  be,  and  that  the  British  have  neglected  the 
moral  factor,  and  emphasized  the  material,  in  build- 
ing up  the  country.  This  brings  up  one  of  the  most 
thorny  problems  that  confront  those  who  are  en- 
gaged in  bringing  Africa  and  Asia  under  European 
control.  On  the  one  hand,  in  Egypt  and  the  Sudan, 
it  can  be  argued  that  there  must  be  money  before 
ambitious  schemes  of  universal  popular  education 
are  undertaken.  Before  the  money  can  be  found,  the 
country  must  be  developed  economically.  It  is  not 
that  public  works  and  material  benefits  are  more 
essential  than  education,  but  that  education  Jor  all 
is  so  tremendously  costly  that  only  a  country  whose 
resources  are  fully  developed  can  maintain  schools  for 
its  population.  It  is  pointed  out,  moreover,  that 
even  if  there  were  money,  teachers  would  be  lacking, 
and  that  it  takes  a  whole  generation  to  train  enough 
teachers  to  meet  even  a  portion  of  the  needs  of  the 
next  generation.  On  the  other  hand,  especially  in 
view  of  what  we  have  said  about  the  necessity  of 
education  before  our  Occidental  social  and  political 
institutions  can  be  wanted,  understood,  and  taken 
advantage  of  by  natives,  is  it  not  true  that  primary 
education  is  as  necessary  to  a  country's  development 
as  railways  and  irrigation,  and  that  if  the  people  are 
to  benefit  by  material  prosperity  they  must  have  a 
moral  preparation? 

Although  I  have  taught  for  some  years  in  educa- 
tional institutions  in  the  Near  East,  and  have  seen 

I6 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


this  problem  at  close  range  in  half  a  dozen  countries, 
I  do  not  profess  to  offer  a  solution.  But  we  must 
make  a  wide  and  determined  start  in  primary  edu- 
cation, and  that  demands  teachers.  To  get  the 
teachers,  higher  institutions  are  necessary.  When 
we  put  boys  through  the  colleges,  few  of  them  want 
to  teach  or  do  teach.  They  become  dissatisfied — as 
they  have  every  reason  to  be — with  existing  con- 
ditions. But  their  patriotism  does  not  inspire  in 
them  the  will  to  make  the  sacrifice  and  to  take  up  the 
cross  individually  in  order  that  their  people  may  be 
brought  to  enlightenment.  Far  from  following  the 
only  possible  way  they  have  of  serving  their  country 
wisely,  they  agitate  for  European  institutions,  for 
social  and  political  recognition,  judging  the  feeling 
and  need  of  the  race  solely  by  their  own  exotic  con- 
dition. The  curse  of  our  Western  education  upon 
Orientals  is  that  we  try  to  build  where  there  is  no 
foundation  of  character.  Instead,  then,  of  having 
wood  that  takes  a  polish,  we  get  a  veneer  that  cracks 
at  the  first  test.  Missionaries  and  educators  have 
success  only  with  boys  whom  they  take  away  from 
their  families  and  bring  under  their  home  influence 
very  early  in  life.  But  they  turn  out  young  men  who 
are  foreigners  to  their  own  people,  and  who  have  no 
desire  or  ability  to  go  back  among  their  own  people 
and  impart  what  has  been  given  to  them.  Good 
farmers  and  goatherds  and  blacksmiths  and  cobblers 
are  spoiled  to  make  imitation  "  gentlemen."  The  edu- 
cated Oriental  will  not  work  even  if  he  is  starving. ' 

'  Several  years  ago  I  was  preaching  in  a  small  inland  city  of  Penn- 
sylvania.   The  local  department  store  proprietor  told  me  that  a 
a  17 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Educating  boys  in  trades,  as  the  Sudan  Education 
Department  has  started  to  do,  is  an  excellent  thing. 
But  it  ought  to  be  done  much  more  widely  than  is 
being  done.  And  money  ought  to  be  spent  more  freely 
than  it  is  being  spent  in  primary  education.  The 
Sudan  boasts  of  fifteen  hundred  miles  of  railway  in 
fifteen  years,  and  two  thousand  miles  of  regular  river 
steamship  service,  and  five  thousand  miles  of  tele- 
graph wires.  But  less  than  five  thousand  Sudanese 
in  schools  of  all  grades,  primary  to  college,  is  not  a 
very  good  showing,  despite  the  difficulties. 

After  the  Cairo  Convention  was  arranged  between 
Egypt  and  Great  Britain  in  January,  1899,  the  Brit- 
ish Foreign  Office  was  in  a  position  to  treat  with  other 
nations  and  other  British  colonies  concerning  the 
boundaries  of  the  Anglo-Eg^'ptian  Sudan.  The 
Anglo-French  Convention  of  1899  settled  the  local 
difficulties  raised  by  the  Marchand  expedition  to 
Fashoda.  When  French  obstruction  and  ill-will 
that  stood  in  the  way  during  the  first  few  years  of 
reconstruction  were  removed  by  the  epoch-making 
Anglo-French  Agreement  of  1904,  the  frontiers  with 
Abyssinia  and  the  Italian  colony  of  Eritrea  were 
arranged  by  several  successive  agreements. 

The  only  serious  difficulty  after  Fashoda,  where 

Christian  Arab  boy  from  "a  college  somewhere  out  in  Turkey"  was 
in  town,  and  that  he  had  somehow  been  unable  to  give  the  boy  work. 
He  was  puzzled,  for  the  boy  seemed  to  be  strong  and  husky.  He 
brought  him  to  me  after  church.  I  thumped  the  fellow  on  the 
chest  and  back,  and,  turning  to  the  merchant,  said,  "Put  him  in 
your  packing  department."  "Oh!  no,  sir,"  the  boy  cried  out  ago- 
nizingly, "I  could  not.  I  do  not  want  Aawd/M/ work.  I  want  mtr/J- 
ful  work." 

18 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


Great  Britain  had  once  more  to  justify  her  presence 
in  the  Sudan  by  claiming  to  act  as  agent  for  the 
Egyptian  Government,  was  when  the  Anglo-Eg}-p- 
tian  troops  occupied,  in  Jtme,  1901,  certain  portions 
of  the  Bahr-el-Ghazal  region,  bordering  on  French 
Equatorial  Africa  and  the  Congo  Free  State.  In 
Paris  and  Brussels  it  was  contended  that  Great  Brit- 
ain had  encroached  upon  territory  leased  to  Belgium 
and  had  exceeded  her  rights  under  the  Convention 
of  1894.  The  British  counter-claim  wholly  de- 
pended upon  "the  former  rights  of  Eg^'pt  in  the 
Sudan." 

The  Sultanate  of  Darfur,  between  Kordofan  and 
Wadai,  was  placed  within  the  British  sphere  by  the 
Anglo-French  Agreement.  Sultan  Ali  accepted  the 
British  Protectorate,  and  agreed  to  pay  a  tribute. 
But  his  country  was  never  made  a  province  of  the 
Sudan,  Uke  Kordofan. '    This  cannot  be  successfully 

'  Owing  to  the  absence  of  effective  control,  German  and  Turkish 
agents  were  able  to  persuade  Sultan  Ali  to  cast  in  his  fortunes  with 
them.  He  paid  no  tribute  in  1915,  and  in  the  spring  of  1916  declared 
the  "  Jehad "2(holy  war),  stating  that  he  had  been  ordered  by  the 
Khalif  of  all  the  Moslems  to  attack  the  Sudan.  The  railway  to  El 
Obeid  made  his  threat  of  Httle  importance  from  the  British  point 
of  view.  But  General  Sir  Reginald  Wingate  decided  to  anticipate  the 
threatened  attack,  and  promptly  sent  a  column  into  Darfur,  which 
occupied  El  Fashr.  It  was  the  Sirdar's  object  to  prevent  the  possi- 
bility of  Ali  making  trouble  for  the  French  in  Wadai :  for  the  Kamerun 
operations  had  depleted  greatly  the  Wadai  garrisons,  and  Sultan 
Ali  knew  this.  If  the  railway  can  now  be  extended  from  El  Obeid 
to  El  Fashr,  the  last  unoccupied  province  of  the  Anglo-Egyptian 
Sudan  will  be  brought  under  effective  administrative  control,  and 
the  cattle  trade  of  the  Sudan  will  be  greatly  increased.  Darfur,  up 
to  this  last  expedition,  has  been  one  of  the  few  countries  in  Africa 
without  a  European  garrison. 

19 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


done  until  the  railway  from  Lake  Chad  to  the  Nile  is 
built.  Then  Abeshr  in  Wadai  and  El  Fashr  in  Dar- 
fur  will  be  the  two  important  points  between  the 
lake  and  El  Obeid,  which  the  Sudan  Government 
railway  reached  in  1913. 

Very  soon  after  the  British  and  Egyptians  went 
back  into  the  Sudan,  the  problem  of  irrigation  began 
to  be  studied.  In  1901,  Sir  William  Garstin  reported 
on  the  possibility  of  using  the  equatorial  lakes  as 
reservoirs.  Lake  Victoria  Nyanza  was  rejected  be- 
cause a  rise  in  its  level  would  flood  shores  which 
were  thickly  populated,  and  half  of  which  were 
German  territory.  Although  the  German  factor  may 
now  be  eliminated,  the  lake  has  become  far  more 
important  than  at  the  time  of  this  report  through  the 
wonderful  development  of  the  colonies  on  its  shores. 
It  is  hardly  possible  to  believe  that  the  opinion  of 
Sir  WilUam  Garstin  will  be  revised.  For  the  colonies 
bordering  the  lake  would  never  consent  to  having  the 
level  raised  and  lowered  for  the  convenience  of 
the  Nile  territories.  Lake  Albert  Nyanza  presented 
similar  difficulties,  for  Belgium  owns  the  western 
shore.  Then,  too,  the  utility  of  irrigating  the  White 
Nile  Valley  is  at  the  best  questionable.  For  it 
passes  through  unrcclaimable  swamp  lands  for 
hundreds  of  miles.  Irrigation  in  the  Blue  Nile 
Valley,  and  the  free  navigation  of  that  river  result- 
ing from  a  control  of  the  water  supply,  would  bring 
a  rich  return.  Lake  Tana,  in  northern  Abyssinia, 
on  the  western  side  of  Mount  Guma,  according  to 
Sir  William  Garstin,  would  make  an  ideal  reservoir. 
The  surrounding  country  is  uninhabited,  and  en- 

20 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


gineering  difBculties  are  much  less  than  in  the  case  of 
Lake  Victoria  or  Lake  Albert. 

By  her  treaties  with  Abyssinia,  France,  and  Italy, 
Great  Britain  became  ten  years  ago  politically  in  a 
position  to  carry  through  the  Garstin  scheme.  It 
has  not  yet  been  done.  Reports  on  the  Sudan  have 
emphasized  year  after  year  the  necessity  and  value  of 
irrigation,  and  in  191 3,  as  we  have  seen  above,  the 
Imperial  Parliament  guaranteed  a  loan,  part  of 
which  was  to  be  spent  in  irrigating  the  Gezira  district, 
on  the  west  bank  of  the  Blue  Nile  south  of  Khartum. 
The  success  of  the  Tayiba  demonstration  station,  in 
this  district,  in  raising  fine  staple  cotton  proved,  just 
before  the  European  War  broke  out,  that  this  irriga- 
tion scheme  was  a  sound  proposition  financially. 
A  wonderful  development  in  cotton  growing  may  be 
expected  after  the  plan  is  carried  through,  and  cotton 
may  before  long  surpass  the  gum  of  the  Kordofan 
forests  as  the  premier  export  article  of  the  Sudan, 

In  this  necessarily  incomplete  survey  of  the  Sudan, 
I  have  saved  the  political  aspect  of  Sir  Reginald 
Wingate's  problem  to  the  last,  not  because  the  task 
of  pacification  has  been  any  less  difficult  or  less  im- 
portant than  the  solution  of  the  financial  problem, 
but  because  the  extension  of  civil  administration 
through  military  operations  had  to  follow  rather  than 
to  go  hand  in  hand  with  economic  development. 

The  Khalifa  escaped  from  Omdurman  after  the 
battle  of  September  6,  1898,  and  had  to  be  pursued 
and  put  out  of  harm's  way.  When  Sir  Reginald  Win- 
gate  succeeded  in  killing  the  Khalifa  and  his  compan- 
ions a  year  later,  Mahdiism  as  a  military  menace 

21 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


disappeared.  But  the  country  was  vast  and  could 
not  be  penetrated  in  a  few  months  or  even  a  few  years. 
The  only  policy  with  any  chance  of  success  was  to 
direct  the  efforts  of  the  Government  toward  the 
speedy  amehoration  of  the  unfortunate  victims  of  the 
dervish  rule,  and  to  win  their  allegiance  through 
lending  them  a  helping  hand.  Their  memory  of 
Egyptian  rule  was  hardly  of  a  nature  to  recommend 
the  new  Government,  and  Egyptian  soldiers  were  not 
looked  upon  as  redeemers — even  from  Mahdiism,  to 
which  many  of  the  most  influential  sheiks  remained 
profoundly  attached  as  a  religious  dogma.  The 
British  administration  had  to  make  itself  known,  not 
by  force,  but  by  winning  confidence  through  refrain- 
ing from  exploiting  the  people  and  giving  them  as 
much  material  benefit  as  possible  in  as  short  a  time 
as  possible.  This  was  Sir  Reginald  Wingate's  policy, 
and  I  have  been  able  to  see  with  my  own  eyes  the 
magic  that  it  has  worked  upon  people  who  are  fanati- 
cal only  if  you  provoke  them  to  fanaticism,  and 
savage  only  if  you  give  them  reason  to  be.  From 
the  very  beginning  of  the  new  administration  at 
Khartum,  the  process  of  pacification  has  been  dis- 
turbed only  by  the  ineluctable  necessity  of  enforcing 
prematurely  a  too  drastic  anti-slavery  policy. 

Not  often  during  the  fifteen  years  from  the  death 
of  the  Khalifa  to  the  outbreak  of  the  European  War 
has  Sir  Reginald  been  compelled  to  show  the  mailed 
fist.  In  1903,  a  new  Mahdi  arose  in  southern  Kor- 
dofan.  He  was  immediately  pursued,  captured,  and 
hanged  at  El  Obeid.  The  criticism  from  England 
against  his  summary  execution  was  very  hard  to  bear, 

22 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


even  though  it  was  inspired  by  sentimentaHty  and 
total  ignorance  of  the  problem  with  which  the  officials 
in  the  Sudan  had  to  deal.  From  1884  to  1 898  Alahdi- 
ism  had  meant  the  extinction  of  nearly  six  million 
lives.'  The  only  way  to  prevent  a  return  to  the 
most  intolerable  and  cruel  despotism  the  valleys  of 
the  Upper  Nile  tributaries  had  ever  known  was  to 
snuff  out  at  the  beginning  every  pretendant  to  the 
Mahdi's  succession.  In  1908,  a  body  of  ex-dervishes 
attacked  and  killed  the  deputy  inspector  of  the  Blue 
Nile  province.  This  was  just  at  the  time  the  "  Yotmg 
Egypt"  party  was  beginning  to  grow  formidable, 
and  their  emissaries  were  working  everywhere  in  the 
Sudan.  A  punitive  expedition  resulted  in  twelve 
death  sentences,  which  were  commuted  to  life 
imprisonment. 

The  pessimism  of  Sir  Eldon  Gorst's  report  for  1909 
extended  to  his  remarks  on  the  Sudan.  He  declared 
that  the  tenth  year  of  the  occupation  was  full  of 
tribal  unrest,  and  that  Mahdiism  was  not  extinguished 

» The  population  of  the  Egyptian  Sudan  was  believed  to  be 
between  eight  and  nine  millions  at  the  beginning  of  the  Mahdi's 
reign.  Five  years  after  the  reconquest,  it  was  still  less  than  two 
millions.  In  the  last  decade,  the  increase  has  been  very  rapid,  so 
that,  in  spite  of  sleeping  sickness  in  the  south,  it  now  exceeds  three 
millions.  The  steady  increase  in  population  is  the  most  striking 
proof  of  the  benefit  of  British  rule.  Intertribal  warfare  has  ceased. 
Security  from  raiding  and  Government  aid  in  combating  disease 
make  cattle-raising  once  more  profitable.  There  has  been  immigra- 
tion from  Abyssinia  and  from  West  Africa.  Only  about  four  thou- 
sand Europeans  are  in  the  Sudan.  Aside  from  the  officials  and  tin  ir 
families,  the  missionaries  and  a  very  few  Europeans  interested  in 
development  schemes  and  archajolog}',  the  foreigners  are  Greeks  and 
Syrians,  who  lend  money,  engage  in  petty  commerce,  and  sell  spirits. 
In  Khartum  street  signs  arc  in  Greek. 

33 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


as  a  faith,  and  had  to  be  carefully  watched  and 
checked  at  every  turn.  There  was  also  much  law- 
lessness along  the  Abyssinian  border.  The  most 
dangerous  districts  were  so  unhealthy  that  the  only 
means  of  maintaining  order  was  to  increase  the  Su- 
danese battalions.  In  191 2,  there  was  an  expedition 
into  Mongalla,  and  an  outbreak  in  southern  Kordof  an. 
There  were  nine  distinct  military  operations  during 
the  course  of  1914. 

If  one  had  only  reports  to  go  by,  one  would  gather 
that  fifteen  years  of  Anglo-Egyptian  occupation  had 
not  brought  peace  to  the  Sudan.  But  one  has  to 
consider  the  enormous  extent  of  the  country,  and  the 
difhculties  of  communication.  Punitive  expeditions 
and  local  uprisings  stand  out:  for  they  are  news. 
When  one  reads  the  newspapers,  he  sees  only  reports 
of  divorces.  Does  he  argue  from  this  that  marriages 
are  generally  unhappy? 

Sir  Reginald  Wingate  was  at  home  on  a  vacation 
when  the  European  War  began.  He  hurried  back  to 
his  post,  and  there  were  many  who  said  that  he 
would  have  very  severe  days  before  him.  The  entry 
of  Turkey  into  the  war  was  expected  by  the  Germans 
to  have  serious  consequences  throughout  North 
Africa.  But  especially  did  they  hope  for  trouble  in 
the  Sudan.  When  I  was  in  Berlin,  in  December, 
1914,  the  collapse  of  British  power  in  the  Moslem 
portion  of  Africa  and  Asia  was  confidently  prophesied. 
There  was  much  faith  in  the  fetish  of  Pan-Islamism. 

A  year  later,  when  it  looked  as  if  Germany  was 
planning  the  invasion  of  Egypt  on  a  large  scale,  and 
the  newspapers  were  full  of  alarming  reports,  I 

24 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


traveled  all  over  Egypt,  and  went  to  Khartum  to 
see  how  matters  stood  in  the  Sudan.  Although  the 
Turks  were  reported  to  be  moving  again  against  the 
Suez  Canal,  and  fighting  with  the  Senussi  was  going 
on  in  the  West,  my  journey  of  four  days  by  rail  and 
steamer  south  from  Cairo  was  exactly  as  in  time  of 
peace. 

It  was  patent  that  no  insurrectional  movement  was 
anticipated  or  feared  by  the  Sudan  Government. 
One-fourth  of  the  British  military  and  civil  staff 
(there  were  less  than  four  hundred  in  all)  had  been 
allowed  to  return  home  to  rejoin  regiments  or  volun- 
teer. No  increase  in  the  British  effectives  had  been 
asked  for,  or  was  contemplated.  For  nearly  a  mil- 
lion square  miles  there  were  less  than  a  thousand 
British  soldiers. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  entrance  of  Turkey  into 
the  war,  the  Sirdar  received  telegrams  and  letters 
from  all  the  principal  chiefs  of  the  Sudan,  expressing 
whole-hearted  loyalty  to  the  British  Empire,  and 
condemning  the  action  of  the  Young  Turks.  These 
were  published  in  a  remarkable  booklet  called 
The  Sudan  Book  of  Loyalty.  Of  all  who  came  forward 
at  that  time  with  declarations  of  sympathy  and 
loyalty,  only  two  have  since  been  put  under  formal 
restraint  by  the  Government  for  political  intrigue 
with  the  enemy. 

Inside  the  Sudan  there  was  only  one  revolt  against 
the  Government,  which  had  to  be  dealt  with  as  a  mili- 
tary operation.  It  was  that  of  a  chieftain  in  the 
Kadugli  district  of  the  Nuba  Mountains,  who  had 
been  deceived  by  enemy  agents  into  believing  that  the 

25 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


power  of  the  British  in  Egypt  and  the  Sudan  was  on 
the  point  of  eclipse.  He  surrendered  at  the  end  of 
191 5.  There  have  been  no  others,  and  it  cannot  be 
too  strongly  emphasized  that  the  police  and  in- 
spection work  in  the  Sudan,  from  the  internal  point 
of  view,  is  only  what  is  usual  in  time  of  peace.  The 
Khalifa's  proclamation  of  the  Holy  War  left  the 
Sudanese  unaffected. 

Seeing  is  believing.  The  Egyptians  are  so  unwar- 
like  a  race  and  so  lacking  in  personal  courage  and 
daring  that  it  was  easy  enough  to  discount  the  Ger- 
man stories  about  the  storm  that  was  going  to  break 
in  Cairo.  I  did  not  have  to  go  to  Egypt  to  reassure 
myself  on  this  point.  But  the  Sudanese,  from  the 
blackest  of  blacks  to  the  most  chocolate-colored  of 
Arabs,  have  no  fear  of  death,  and  are  heroes  of  many 
a  charge,  in  the  face  of  desperate  odds,  that  surpasses 
Balaclava.  The  Sudanese,  too,  are  fanatical  Mos- 
lems, with  all  the  zeal  and  enthusiasm  that  belongs 
to  primitive  races  and  neophytes.  I  had  been  living 
for  years  in  an  atmosphere  where  Pan-Islamism  was 
the  absorbing  topic  of  conversation  and  the  night- 
mare of  my  British  official  friends.  So  I  needed  to 
go  to  Klhartum. 

By  pure  chance  the  trip  into  the  Sudan  was  well- 
timed.  I  was  there  for  the  two  important  jetes  of 
the  year,  the  birthday  of  the  Prophet  {Muled-el- 
Nebi)  and  the  anniversary  of  the  visit  of  the  King  and 
Queen  of  England,  who  had  stopped  at  Port  Sudan 
on  the  way  back  from  India,  and  held  a  review 
at  Sinkat,  on  January  17,  1912.  King's  Day  was 
celebrated  by  an  impressive  service  at  the  Khartum 

26 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


Cathedral.  After  the  garrison  left  the  church,  they 
stood  on  parade  and  Sir  Reginald  Wingate  read  a 
cablegram  from  the  King.  It  was  a  stirring  sight  to 
see  these  few  hundred  British  soldiers,  the  only  mili- 
tary evidence  of  British  power  in  the  midst  of  war  in 
one  of  the  largest  Moslem  regions  in  Africa. 

After  dinner  on  the  evening  of  King's  Day,  Sir 
Reginald  took  me  down  into  the  Palace  garden  to  see 
the  Sudanese  band  that  had  been  playing  during  the 
meal.  We  passed  through  the  circle  around  the 
conductor,  and  stood  in  their  midst  while  they 
played  some  Niam-Niam  marches.  The  Sirdar  was 
in  full-dress  uniform,  and  bareheaded.  A  couple  of 
torches  gave  light.  The  black  faces  and  weird  music 
made  me  feel  that  I  was  certainly  surrounded  by 
savages  in  the  heart  of  Africa.  But  they  were 
savages  whose  affection  for  their  big  chief  was  evi- 
dent in  the  way  they  looked  at  him  and  the  vim  with 
which  they  played.  I  thought  back  a  year,  and  I  was 
in  the  Vaterland  Cafe  in  Berlin.  There  was  music, 
too,  and  I  was  listening  to  an  authority  on  the  Near 
East.  "The  Sudanese,  you  know,"  he  said,  "are 
certainly  coming  in  with  us — when  they  realize  that 
the  Sultan  has  raised  the  Green  Standard.  They  are 
devils,  and  the  black  pagan  tribes  will  follow  readily 
the  Moslems.  They  really  hate  the  British  rule. 
What  happened  to  Gordon  will  seem  little  beside 
this  approaching  tragedy,  just  as  the  Sepoy  Rebel- 
lion will  seem  little  compared  to  what  is  going  to 
happen  in  India. " 

Sir  Reginald  Wingate  asked  me  to  go  to  Omdurman 
with  him  to  the  dervish  celebration  of  the  Prophet's 

27 


THE  XEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


birthday.  We  were  a  party  of  about  thirty:  the 
Grand  Cadi,  the  Grand  Mufti,  several  officers  from 
the  British  regiment  stationed  at  Khartum,  ^Ir.  More, 
the  Civil  Governor  of  Khartum  Province,  Sir  Regi- 
nald's associates  in  the  Government,  and  his  personal 
staff.  We  left  the  Palace  steps  at  nine  o'clock  in  the 
evening  for  the  trip  on  the  Blue  Nile  to  Omdurman. 
Our  steamer  was  the  Elfin,  which  was  used  by  Gordon 
in  the  old  days  more  than  thirty  years  ago. 

At  the  landing-stage,  about  half  a  mile  from  the 
city  walls,  a  great  crowd  of  white-robed  dervishes 
was  waiting  to  form  the  guard  of  honor.  Each 
held  a  flaming  torch.  The  Sudan  women,  harking 
back  to  jungle  days,  greeted  the  Sirdar  with  a  shrill 
cry,  which  they  make  tremolo  by  pressing  fingers  on 
their  Hps.  Into  the  city  past  the  Mahdi's  tomb  and 
the  KhaHfa's  ruined  palace  we  rode  to  a  large  open 
space,  where  innumerable  tents  were  dressed  for  the 
celebration.  The  Omdurman  municipality,  the  im- 
portant Omdehs  (headmen)  of  the  neighboring 
villages  and  various  tribes,  and  the  sheiks  of  the 
many  reUgious  orders  all  have  their  tents.  With 
untiring  physical  energy  and  good  humor  and 
capacity  for  "pink  lemonade"  of  the  good  old  circus 
variety,  which  was  forced  upon  us  in  every  tent,  Sir 
Reginald  Wingate  led  us  from  place  to  place.  No 
tent  was  too  humble  to  be  omitted,  no  sheik  too  in- 
significant to  be  passed  over.  One  religious  leader, 
who  received  the  Sirdar  as  an  equal  on  this  night,  is 
a  cook  in  private  life.  "And  a  good  cook,  too, "  the 
Sirdar  told  me. 

I  had  the  good  fortune  to  meet  and  talk  with  the 

28 


GREAT  BRITAIN  IN  THE  SUDAN 


most  revered  of  the  religious  chieftains,  El  Sayyed 
Ali  Morghani— now  Sir  Ali  Morghani,  K.C.M.G., 
for  he  received  a  knighthood  from  the  King  in  the 
last  birthday  honors.  Sir  Ali  is  a  modest,  unassum- 
ing man  of  about  forty,  with  a  shrewd,  keen  mind. 
He  knows  what  is  going  on  in  the  world,  for  he  asked 
me  some  searching  questions  about  conditions  in 
France  and  the  Balkans.  Sir  Ali,  who  is  revered  as 
a  "holy  man"  above  all  the  religious  leaders  of  the 
Sudan,  has  no  doubt  whatever  of  the  sincere  attach- 
ment of  the  Moslems  of  Africa  to  the  cause  of  Great 
Britain.  I  think  that  he  believes  exactly  what  he 
told  me. 

When  Sir  Reginald  Wingate  explained  to  the  sheiks 
who  I  was  and  what  I  had  come  to  the  Sudan  for, 
they  nodded  their  heads  with  satisfaction,  and 
laughed.  "Tell  him  to  write  what  he  sees,"  they 
declared.  "We  are  glad  that  he  came  for  the  feast, 
for  he  can  give  the  English  and  French  and  Americans 
a  good  report  of  us." 

The  last  tent  we  visited  was  the  most  important, 
and  around  it  gathered  all  the  people  of  Omdurman 
and  the  tribes  who  had  come  into  the  city  for  the 
festivities.  Thousands  of  white-robed  howling  or 
barking  dervishes  were  dancing  and  shouting,  having 
reached  the  point  of  frenzy.  We  sat  sipping  coffee 
in  the  midst  of  a  crowd  of  sixty  thousand  Moslems, 
most  of  whom  had  been  followers  of  the  Mahdi  and  be- 
lievers in  the  Khalifa.  The  Sirdar's  guard  of  honor 
was  four  Sudanese  lancers  on  horse.  There  were  no 
troops,  either  Egyptia7i  or  British.  None  of  our 
party  was  armed.    The  people  of  Omdurman,  at  the 

29 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


moment  of  the  greatest  religious  exaltation  of  the 
year,  had  here  in  their  power  the  Governor-General 
and  the  chief  representatives  of  British  authority  in 
the  Sudan. 

I  know  what  the  feeling  of  Moslem  fanaticism  and 
anti-Christian  feeling  is  in  an  Oriental  crowd.  I  have 
experienced  it  more  than  once  when  I  knew  that  I 
was  facing  death.  But  that  feeling  was  not  here. 
There  was  real  love  for  the  Sirdar — and  no  hostility 
to  the  rest  of  us. 

As  we  were  leaving  the  tent,  one  of  the  turbaned 
dervish  chieftains  who  had  followed  the  Sirdar  to  the 
entrance,  put  his  left  hand  on  my  shoulder  as  he 
shook  hands,  and  said,  "I  hope  you  have  enjoyed 
the  feast  at  Omdurman  and  will  come  again. " 

"Who  is  that  sheik?"  I  asked  Sir  Reginald 
Wingate. 

"One  of  the  Mahdi's  sons, "  he  answered. 


30 


CHAPTER  II 


THE  ISLANDS  OF  AFRICA 
HE  islands   around  Africa   are   owned  by 


Portugal,  Spain,  Great  Britain,  and  France, 


and  the  title  to  their  possession  generally 
goes  far  back  beyond  the  period  of  European 
colonization  of  the  mainland.  In  the  old  days 
of  sailing  vessels,  when  the  route  to  India  was 
around  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope,  islands  had  a 
unique  value.  There  were,  of  course,  ports  of  call 
on  the  mainland.  But  they  were  never  free  from 
the  attacks  of  the  savages,  and  did  not  afford 
security  for  the  storing  of  supplies.  Nor  did  the 
mainland  lend  itself  as  well  as  islands  to  economic  de- 
velopment and  the  spread  of  civilization  in  the  days 
when  colonial  forces  were  small  and  colonists  few. 
Europe  in  Africa — on  the  large  scale  of  administra- 
tive possession  and  economic  development — was 
possible  only  after  steamships  and  railways  had 
passed  the  experimental  stage,  and  when  the  intense 
production  of  the  new  industrial  era  created  surplus 
population  and  surplus  goods  for  which  an  outlet 
must  be  found.  Europe  did  not  take  possession  of 
Africa  as  a  result  of  the  explorations  of  Livingstone, 
Stanley,  Peters,  de  Brazza,  and  others.    The  ex- 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


plorers  were  the  pioneers  of  a  Europe  ready  and  need- 
ing to  follow  the  path  they  blazed. 

Aside  from  the  Madeira  Islands  and  the  Azores, 
which  are  administratively  regarded  as  integral  parts 
of  the  Republic,  Portugal  has  the  important  Cape 
Verde  group,  the  Bissagos  Archipelago  off  Portuguese 
Guinea,  and  the  two  httle  islands  of  Sao  Thome  and 
Principe  in  the  Gulf  of  Guinea,  which  are  treated  in 
the  chapter  on  the  Portuguese  colonies. 

The  Canary  Islands  are  administratively  a  portion 
of  the  Spanish  monarchy :  so  the  minister  of  colonies, 
who  once  had  under  his  control  an  Empire  that  only 
Britain  has  since  been  able  to  match,  gives  most  of 
the  attention  of  his  department  to  the  one  rich  little 
island  of  Fernando  Po  near  the  mouth  of  the  Niger, 
far  in  the  Gulf  of  Guinea.  The  only  interest  of  this 
island,  in  the  international  scheme  of  things,  is  the 
fact  that  it  commands  the  approach  to  the  German 
colony  of  Kamerun,  just  as  Zanzibar  controls  the 
approach  to  Germany's  principal  port  in  her  East 
African  colony.  Spain  has  also,  southeast  of  Fer- 
nando Po,  a  foothold  on  the  mainland,  called  Spanish 
Guinea,  which  is  an  enclave  in  the  Kamerun  (just 
as  the  British  enclave  of  Walfisch  Bay  controls  the 
outlet  of  the  Swakop  and  Kuiseb  rivers  in  German 
Southwest  Africa).  Should  Spain  ever  desire  to 
part  with  one  or  all  of  her  colonies,  France  has  the 
treaty  right  of  preemption. 

The  British  and  French  islands  are  most  conven- 
iently placed  along  the  trade  routes  around  the  con- 
tinent and  across  the  Atlantic  and  Indian  oceans. 

Great  Britain  has,  beside  Walfisch  Bay,  the  wee 

32 


THE  ISLANDS  OF  AFRICA 


HoUam's  Archipelago  and  Possession  Island  off  the 
coast  of  German  Southwest  Africa.  The  latter  is 
at  the  northern  end  of  Luderitzland,  not  far  from  the 
port  of  Angra  Pequena.  Huge  Madagascar  lies  off 
the  coast  of  Portuguese  East  Africa,  almost  parallel- 
ing the  entire  stretch  from  Lorenzo-Marquez  in 
Delagoa  Bay  at  the  south  to  Cape  Delgado  on  the 
north.  The  distance  is  not  great  from  the  Portu- 
guese port  of  Mozambique  to  Madagascar.  In  the 
southern  part  of  the  canal  between  Mozambique  and 
Madagascar,  France  has  the  two  small  islands  of 
Bassas  da  India  and  Isle  de  I'Europe.  Between  Cape 
Delgado,  which  marks  the  boundary  of  German  East 
Africa  and  Portuguese  East  Africa,  and  the  northern 
end  of  Madagascar,  lies  the  Comores  Archipelago,  also 
belonging  to  France.  Great  Britain  has  Zanzibar  and 
Pemba  as  sentinels  between  the  German  port  of  Dar-es- 
Salaam  and  her  port  of  Mombasa.  Farther  out  into  the 
ocean,  off  the  coast  of  German  East  Africa  and  north 
of  Madagascar,  Assumption,  Aldabra,  Astove,  Saint 
Pierre,  Providence,  Cerf  Islands,  and  the  archipela- 
goes of  Cosmoledo  and  Farquhar  fly  the  Union  Jack. 

On  the  way  to  India  from  Zanzibar,  beyond  the 
islands  just  named,  are  Mahe,  Felicite,  the  Amirantes 
and  others,  which  form  the  Seychelles.  They  are 
under  British  rule.  Five  hundred  miles  east  of 
Madagascar  is  Mauritius,  with  dependent  islands, 
which  England  conquered  from  France  in  i8io. 
In  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  on  the  way  to  South  America, 
are  Ascension  Island,  St.  Helena,  and  the  Tristan 
da  Cunha  group,  convenient  sentinels  to  keep  the 
ocean  for  the  British. 

3  33 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


From  the  standpoint  of  African  colonial  history, 
British  Zanzibar  and  French  Madagascar  have  alone 
influenced  European  colonial  policy  and  the  history 
of  African  colonial  expansion.  We  can  eliminate 
all  the  others.  But  brief  mention  must  be  made  of 
the  recent  history  and  development  of  Zanzibar  and 
Madagascar. 

ZANZIBAR 

Zanzibar  and  its  small  northern  neighbor,  Pemba, 
are,  like  SomaUland,  connected  racially,  historically, 
and  religiously  with  Arabia  rather  than  with  Africa. 
They  came  under  the  control  of  Muscat  when  the 
Portuguese  Empire  began  to  crumble.  For  twenty- 
five  years,  in  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
Zanzibar  was  connected  poHtically  with  Muscat.  It 
became  an  independent  sultanate  again  in  1856. 
Not  until  she  found  Germany  installed  on  the  main- 
land of  Africa,  north  of  Portuguese  Mozambique, 
and  France  making  plans  for  the  conquest  of  Mada- 
gascar, did  Great  Britain  feel  impelled  to  get  posses- 
sion of  Zanzibar  and  Pemba.  A  treaty  establishing 
the  British  Protectorate  was  secretly  made;  and 
France  and  Germany  were  confronted  with  a  fait 
accompli.  These  two  Powers  were  placated  by  the 
agreements  of  1890.  France  was  given  a  free  foot 
in  Madagascar:  and  Heligoland  was  ceded  to  Ger- 
many. France  and  Germany  recognized  the  Zanzi- 
bar Protectorate:  and  Germany  paid  one  million 
dollars  to  the  Sultan  of  Zanzibar  for  his  rights  on  the 
mainland  they  had  occupied  six  years  earlier. 

34 


THE  ISLANDS  OF  AFRICA 


Since  the  rise  of  German  naval  power,  Heligoland 
has  proved  of  far  more  importance  than  the  British 
Government  ever  dreamed  it  would  be.  In  view 
of  what  has  happened  since  the  outbreak  of  the  war 
in  Europe,  the  British  must  have  come  to  the  opinion 
that  the  price  paid  for  Zanzibar  was  pretty  high. 

The  importance  of  Zanzibar  as  a  trading  center  has 
diminished  in  recent  years  through  the  development 
of  the  coast  ports  of  French  and  Italian  Somaliland, 
and  of  German  and  British  East  Africa.  The  Ger- 
man railway  from  Lake  Tanganyika  to  the  coast  at 
Dar-es-Salaam  is  the  most  important  factor  in  pre- 
venting the  expansion  that  had  been  hoped  for  in 
Zanzibar.  The  total  trade  has  for  some  years  re- 
mained stationary  at  about  ten  million  dollars.  The 
most  lucrative  industry  of  the  island  remains  clove- 
raising. 

In  1 90 1,  the  old  Sultan  was  succeeded  by  Ali,  a 
youth  of  nineteen,  who  vacated  the  throne  after  ten 
years  of  an  uneventful  reign.  During  this  period, 
however,  British  control  became  effective,  and  the 
Pan-Islamic  movement  brought  no  serious  problem. 
In  1913,  the  control  of  the  island  was  handed  over  to 
the  Colonial  Office  by  the  Foreign  Office,  and  a  Brit- 
ish resident  given  the  title  of  High  Commissioner. 
Zanzibar  had  been  separated  from  British  East  Africa 
in  1904,  although  it  had  been  included  in  the  original 
charter  of  the  British  East  Africa  Company. 

A  recent  movement  to  bring  the  two  Protectorates 
under  one  control,  as  has  been  accomplished  in 
British  West  Africa,  has  not  yet  succeeded.  The 
problem  of  the  Indians  stands  in  the  way.  Indians 

35 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


are  numerous  in  Zanzibar.  Since  the  abolition  of 
slavery,  they  have  become  the  real  possessors  of  the 
land.  As  they  ply  the  trade  of  money-lenders, 
the  Arab  farmers  and  planters  are  in  their  power. 
The  majority  of  the  Zanzibar  Indians  did  not  come 
directly  from  India,  but  are  of  South  African  origin. 
They  left  that  part  of  the  British  Empire  because 
they  could  not  secure  there  the  rights  of  British 
subjects.  In  their  new  home,  they  note  the  recent 
measures  taken,  and  the  new  measures  agitated,  in 
British  East  Africa  against  Indians,  and  fear  that 
incorporation  with  the  mainland  Government  will 
once  more  make  of  them  pariahs. 

The  most  interesting  contribution  of  Zanzibar  to 
the  experimental  solution  of  European  colonization 
problems  in  Africa  is  the  method  of  abolition  of 
slavery.  It  was  a  peculiarly  advantageous  field  for 
the  tackling  of  this  problem.  Zanzibar  and  Pemba 
are  islands.  The  inhabitants  are  Moslems.  Islamic 
law  is  the  law  of  the  land.  Mr.  B.  S.  Cave,  British 
Agent  and  Consul-General,  gave  a  valuable  review 
of  the  successive  steps  of  the  emancipation  policy 
in  a  report  issued  in  1909.  It  is  well  worth  studying. 
The  Sultan  issued  a  decree  in  1897,  ordaining  that  no 
child  thereafter  born  could  be  a  slave,  and  made 
provision  by  which  slaves  could  obtain  freedom.  In 
eleven  years  eleven  thousand  slaves  were  emanci- 
pated. Voluntary  emancipation  went  very  slowly 
at  first.  Older  slaves  were  naturally  unwilling  to 
accept  freedom.  But  the  gradual  process  of  enfran- 
chisement did  not  arouse  Arab  fanaticism;  the  eman- 
cipated natives  did  not  become  demoralized  by  a 

36 


THE  ISLANDS  OF  AFRICA 


sudden  change  in  their  status  for  which  they  were  not 
prepared ;  and  local  industries  and  agriculture  suffered 
scarcely  at  all.  During  that  time,  the  general  and 
local  problems  arising  from  emancipation  had  been 
met  and  examined.  So  the  experience  of  eleven 
years  could  be  used  to  advantage  in  framing  a  gen- 
eral emancipation  decree  that  would  neither  violate 
Moslem  sensibilities  nor  upset  the  economic  life  of 
the  country. 

In  June,  1909,  the  Sultan  signed  a  decree  forbidding 
recognition  by  the  Courts  of  the  status  of  slavery  in 
the  islands  of  Zanzibar  and  Pemba.  Compensation 
was  provided  for  slaves  whose  previous  masters  would 
now  refuse  to  support  them  because  age,  ill  health,  or 
physical  disability  prevented  them  from  earning  a 
living.  The  rights  of  concubines  under  Moslem 
law  w^ould  not  be  recognized,  if  concubines,  taking 
advantage  of  the  emancipation  decree,  left  their 
former  masters  without  consent.  Nor  would  they 
have  the  right  of  custody  of  their  children  by  the 
master  whom  they  left. 

One  admires  the  sagacity  and  patient  wisdom  of 
those  who  had  to  deal  with  the  slave  problem  in 
Zanzibar.  Resisting  the  pressure  brought  to  bear 
upon  them  by  thoughtless  sentimentalists  in  England, 
and  enduring  misrepresentation  and  vitriolic  denun- 
ciation on  the  part  of  those  who  had  not  the  slightest 
knowledge  of  the  subject  upon  which  they  were 
talking,'  the  British  administrators  kept  quietly 

'  The  French  Abolition  Decree  of  1896  in  Madagascar  was  held  up 
as  the  "only  right  and  honorable  step"  for  Great  Britain  to  take. 
The  two  cases  were  totally  difTcrcnt,  of  course,  Zanzibar  being  under 

37 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


at  their  task.  When  the  moment  of  reaHzation 
arrived,  the  vindication  of  their  conservative  policy 
was  complete.  Emancipation  in  Zanzibar  has  been 
so  strikingly  successful  that  it  has  given  heart — and 
a  potent  argument — to  others  who  are  confronted 
with  the  same  perplexing  task  on  the  mainland,  and 
who  have  to  bear  all  the  while  insult  and  impugnment 
of  motives  from  cranks  in  England.  If  any  one 
believes  that  the  only  way  to  effect  a  reform  is  to 
make  it  immediately  and  sweepingly,  and  that  the 
British  flag  must  mean  freedom  for  all  over  whom  it 
is  hoisted  by  the  very  fact  of  its  being  hoisted  and  at 
the  very  moment  it  is  hoisted,  let  him  read  Mr.  Cave's 
report. 

MADAGASCAR 

Madagascar  is  by  far  the  largest  island  depending 
upon  the  continent  of  Africa.  The  area  of  France 
is  207,000  square  miles.  Madagascar's  area  is 
227,000  square  miles.  The  population  of  the  island, 
which  is  nearly  a  thousand  miles  long,  is  3,200,000, 
of  whom  over  3,000,000  belong  to  the  Malagasy  race. 
The  people  are  of  many  distinct  tribes,  with  different 
languages.  The  most  intelligent  and  numerous,  the 
Hovas,  number  nearly  a  million. 

France  got  a  foothold  in  Madagascar  between  1882 
and  1884,  at  the  time  when  Germany  and  Great 
Britain  were  feverishly  putting  under  their  flags  all 
that  was  left  up  to  that  time  on  the  African  mainland. 

Islamic  law,  and  the  harem  consideration  complicating  the  problem. 
Some  of  Zanzihiir's  most  influential  chiefs,  in  close  connection  with 
Mecca,  had  been  African  slave-traders. 

38 


THE  ISLANDS  OF  AFRICA 


As  we  have  seen  above,  after  Great  Britain 
seized  Zanzibar,  she  agreed  to  leave  a  free  field  to 
France  in  Madagascar.  But  the  Malagasy,  not 
having  been  consulted,  were  of  another  mind.  Queen 
Ranavalona,  loyally  sustained  by  the  Hovas,  refused 
to  recognize  the  legaUty  of  "treaties"  made  by  local 
chiefs  for  the  cession  of  bits  of  coast  land  to  France. 
What  government  would  recognize  a  right  acquired 
in  this  way?  By  the  same  token,  the  Protectorate 
was  not  recognized.  France  had  to  enter  upon  a 
war  of  conquest,  and  annex  the  island  without  the 
consent  either  of  government  or  people.  The  Queen 
was  deposed  and  sent  into  exile.  Madagascar  was 
declared  a  French  possession.  The  Malagasy  who 
opposed  were  treated  as  rebels. 

In  the  early  days  of  French  activity  in  Madagascar, 
there  was  much  opposition  to  France  and  criticism 
of  France  in  the  British  press.  The  agitation  was 
fed  by  Protestant  missionaries,  who  claimed  that 
their  work  was  ruined,  and  that  the  French  were 
acting  with  great  cruelty  towards  natives,  whose 
only  crime  was  love  of  country  and  liberty.  But  as 
Great  Britain  was  at  the  time  meditating  the  gob- 
bling up  of  the  Dutch  republics  in  South  Africa,  the 
official  ear  was  deaf  to  the  cry  of  outraged  humanity. 
The  French  went  to  Tananarive  in  the  same  year  that 
Jameson  went  to  Johannesburg :  and  Queen  Ranava- 
lona was  exiled  to  Algiers  in  the  same  year  that  Presi- 
dent Kruger  made  his  desperate  personal  appeal  to 
Europe.  The  French  received  Kruger  with  great 
enthusiasm,  and  the  English  held  meetings  in  Albert 
Hall  to  wax  indignant  over  the  fate  of  the  Queen 

39 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


of  Madagascar.  But  neither  Government  made  the 
other  hold  back  from  the  poHcy  of  arbitrary  conquest. 
The  friends  of  "liberty  and  justice  and  the  freedom 
of  small  nationalities"  did  what  they  always  have 
done — and  no  more  than  they  always  have  done. 
They  protested,  and  cried  out  against  the  iniquity 
in  the  world.  No  Government  espoused  the  cause 
of  Boers  or  Malagasy. 

The  results  in  Madagascar,  just  as  the  results  in 
South  Africa,  have  proved  distinctly  beneficial  to  the 
people  of  the  country.  If  the  end  has  not  justified 
the  means,  it  has  at  least  caused  the  means  to 
be  forgotten.  The  South  African  Commonwealth 
brings  credit  upon  the  working  out  of  British  colonial 
policy.  Madagascar  is  a  credit  to  France.  There 
was  much  initial  suffering  to  native  races,  and  a  great 
amount  of  injustice  in  the  early  years.  This  is 
proved  by  the  appeal  of  the  Native  Races  Protection 
Committee,  issued  in  Paris  in  1900,  which  declared 
that  the  forced  labor  of  the  Malagasy  was  a  crying 
scandal;  that  they  were  in  a  condition  of  slavery 
worse  than  that  which  the  French  Government  had 
abolished  by  proclamation  four  years  before  they 
conquered  the  island ;  and  that  the  taxes  amounted  to 
exploitation.  It  was  asserted  that  forced  labor  on 
roads  was  reducing  the  robust  male  population  on  the 
island;  that  natives  were  arrested  and  imprisoned 
without  trial,  and  then  compelled  to  work,  because 
they  were  prisoners,  without  pay.  Similar  condi- 
tions have  prevailed  in  all  European  colonies  in  Africa 
at  the  beginning  of  European  administration.  But 
always  in  British  colonies,  and  often  in  French  and 

40 


THE  ISLANDS  OF  AFRICA 


German  colonies,  they  have  been  remedied  with  the 
change  from  mihtary  to  civil  administration. 

Madagascar  to-day  has  over  two  miUion  acres 
under  cultivation.  Although  rubber  is  the  principal 
product,  sugar,  coffee,  cloves,  cotton,  vanilla,  and 
vegetables  are  raised  in  considerable  quantity. 
Scientific  development  of  forest  products,  govern- 
ment initiative  in  cattle  breeding,  and  the  introduc- 
tion of  silk- worms  have  done  much  for  the  prosperity 
of  the  natives.  Mines  are  being  opened  up.  There 
are  nearly  nine  thousand  miles  of  telegraph  and 
telephone  Hnes.  Railway  construction  has  advanced 
slowly.  But  there  are  many  good  roads,  and  motor- 
lorries  are  in  use  extensively.  The  revolution  in 
motor  transport  through  the  invention  and  develop- 
ment of  the  automobile  has  changed  remarkably  the 
problem  of  transport  on  islands.  Where  plantations 
are  large  and  the  haul  to  the  port  is  not  more  than 
two  hundred  kilometers,  it  is  a  question  whether  the 
public  interest  is  not  better  served  by  good  roads  than 
by  railways.  The  planter  can  load  the  automobile 
truck  in  the  field,  and  unload  directly  at  the  steamer. 
The  haul  is  down  to  sea-level.  The  experience  of  the 
French  army  at  Verdun  furnishes  an  excellent  means 
of  computing  wear  and  tear  on  roads,  and  expense  of 
upkeep. 

France  was  beginning  to  find  a  return  in  Madagas- 
car when  the  Great  War  broke  out.  There  was 
trade  with  France  to  the  amount  of  seventy-five 
million  francs  in  191 3.  Of  the  ten  thousand  ships 
that  entered  Madagascar  ports  during  that  year, 
nearly  seven  thousand  carried  the  French  flag. 

41 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Some  of  France's  most  illustrious  military  men,  of 
whom  notable  examples  are  Generals  Gallieni  and 
Lyautey,  made  their  reputation  and  gained  the 
experience  that  has  enabled  them  to  serve  their 
country  so  well  in  the  military  and  civil  administra- 
tion of  Madagascar.  With  the  different  tribes  and 
languages,  and  no  railways  through  the  interior, 
the  task  was  arduous,  and  required  unflagging 
enthusiasm  as  well  as  tact  and  nerve.  In  Morocco 
lately,  and  on  the  battlefields  of  the  Mame  and 
Meuse  and  Somme,  France  has  much  to  be  grateful 
for  in  having  had  Madagascar  to  train  her  chiefs. 

Most  important  of  all  things  is  the  fact  that  the 
French,  in  spite  of  their  bad  start,  have  succeeded  in 
winning  the  natives.  Second  only  to  the  Senagalese 
have  been  the  Malagasy  in  their  zeal  to  serve  France 
in  this  war.  I  had  been  reading  last  April  much  that 
condemned  the  French  in  Madagascar.  Just  then 
General  GalHeni  died.  I  went  with  all  Paris  to  pass 
before  his  bier  in  the  chapclle  ardente  that  had  been 
made  before  the  church  door  in  the  courtyard  of  the 
Invalides.  The  guard  of  honor  around  the  coffin 
were  Malagasy. 


42 


CHAPTER  III 


THE  LAST  YEARS  OF  THE  BOER  WAR  AND 
THE  PERIOD  OF  RECONSTRUCTION 
IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 

BOTH  from  a  military  and  political  point  of 
view,  the  year  1900  brought  great  disappoint- 
ment to  the  British  Cabinet  and  to  the 
commanders  of  the  British  army  in  South  Africa. 
It  had  been  confidently  expected  that  the  over- 
whelming odds  against  the  Boers  would  result  in  a 
few  months  in  the  complete  collapse  of  their  power, 
if  not  of  their  will,  to  resist.  But  the  arrival  of  Lord 
Roberts  and  the  surrender  of  Cronje's  army  in  Febru- 
ary did  not  prove  to  be  "the  beginning  of  the  end." 
Although  Lady  smith  was  reheved  in  March,  and 
Mafeking  in  May,  the  task  seemed  almost  as  formi- 
dable as  at  the  beginning.  The  British  had  to  con- 
tend with  the  undisguised  sympathy  of  the  Boers  in 
Cape  Colony  for  the  cause  of  the  Republics.  As  war 
prisoners  frequently  escaped  from  Simonstown,  Cronje 
and  his  army  were  deported  to  St.  Helena.  Although 
most  of  the  Cape  Colony  rebels,  after  the  withdrawal 
of  the  Free  State  commandos  in  March,  took  advan- 
tage of  Lord  Milner's  amnesty  proclamation,  the  Boers 
of  the  Colony  continued  to  use  pohtical  weapons 

43 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


against  the  British.  There  was  a  ministerial  crisis 
in  June.  Many  members  of  the  Cape  Colony 
Assembly  were  under  arrest  for  treason,  and  yet 
the  new  Pregressive  Government  had  only  a  majority 
of  six. 

Lord  Roberts  sailed  from  Cape  Town  on  December 
1st,  fully  satisfied  that  he  was  leaving  to  Lord 
Kitchener  a  guerilla  warfare  that  could  not  last  out 
the  winter.  Five  days  after  his  departure,  an 
Afrikander  Congress  met  at  Worcester  which  passed 
resolutions  disapproving  the  attitude  of  Lord  Milner, 
denouncing  the  British  conduct  of  the  war,  declaring 
that  the  white  population  of  South  Africa  would  be  ex- 
terminated if  peace  were  not  soon  made,  and  demand- 
ing that  the  RepubHcs  be  allowed  to  retain  their 
independence.  In  Europe,  French  public  opinion 
was  bitterly  hostile  to  Great  Britain.  Queen  Victoria 
and  the  Prince  of  Wales,  no  less  than  Chamberlain 
and  other  members  of  the  Government,  were  sub- 
jected in  France  to  a  campaign  of  caricature  and 
scathing  criticism  hardly  less  violent  than  that  which 
Kaiser  Wilhelm,  the  Crown  Prince,  and  von  Beth- 
mann-HoUweg  have  experienced  since  August  1st, 
1 9 14.  President  Kruger  was  received  with  hysterical 
enthusiasm  in  Paris.  In  view  of  the  changes  of  the 
last  fifteen  years,  it  is  curious  to  have  to  record  that 
it  was  Kaiser  Wilhelm's  refusal  to  receive  Kruger 
that  checkmated  the  Boer  hopes  of  receiving  sub- 
stantial aid  from  Europe. 

Early  in  1901  martial  law  had  to  be  declared 
throughout  Cape  Colony.  In  Natal,  as  well  as  in 
Cape  Colony,  Ministers,  unable  to  depend  upon 

44 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


parliamentary  support,  were  driven  to  the  ineluctable 
necessity  of  acting  illegally.  The  Cape  Parliament 
was  twice  prorogued.  Newspapers  were  suppressed, 
and  editors  prosecuted.  Trials  for  treason  in  Cape 
Colony  and  Natal  resulted,  in  some  cases,  in  the 
imposition  of  the  death  penalty. 

On  August  7  th,  Lord  Kitchener  issued  a  drastic 
proclamation,  which  annoimced  the  annexation  of 
the  Orange  Free  State  and  the  "late  South  Afri- 
can Republic."  He  declared  that  "Her  Majesty's 
Forces  are  in  possession  of  the  seats  of  government, 
the  whole  machinery  of  administration,  and  the 
principal  towns  and  railway  Hnes  of  these  two  terri- 
tories; that  only  a  few  burghers  are  still  under  arms 
and,  being  short  of  ammunition,  are  imable  to  carry 
on  regular  warfare.  Her  Majesty's  Government  is 
determined  to  put  an  end  to  a  state  of  things  which  is 
aimlessly  prolonging  bloodshed  and  destruction  and 
inflicting  ruin  upon  the  great  majority  of  inhabitants, 
who  are  anxious  to  live  in  peace  and  to  earn  a  liveli- 
hood for  themselves  and  their  families."  Therefore, 
Lord  Kitchener,  under  instructions  from  Her  Majes- 
ty's Government,  declared  that  the  leaders  of  the 
Boer  armies  who  did  not  surrender  before  September 
15th  would  be  permanently  banished  from  South 
Africa,  and  that  "the  cost  of  the  maintenance  of  the 
families  of  the  burghers  in  the  field  who  had  not 
surrendered  by  September  15th  would  be  recoverable 
from  such  burghers  and  be  a  charge  upon  their  prop- 
erty movable  and  unmovable  in  the  two  colonies." 

Lord  Kitchener  was  disappointed  in  the  effect  of 
this  measure.    It  only  exasperated  the  Boers,  and 

45 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


strengthened  their  will  to  resist  to  the  bitter  end. 
Ten  thousand  Boers  were  holding  in  check  a  British 
army  of  over  two  hundred  thousand.  Their  hatred 
of  the  British  was  increased  by  the  drastic  step  which 
Lord  Kitchener  felt  compelled  to  take  of  establishing 
concentration  camps,  and  of  extending  the  area  of 
"pacified"  territory  by  means  of  a  chain  of  block- 
houses. The  terrible  mortality  among  women  and 
children  in  these  concentration  camps  called  forth 
a  unanimous  protest  from  the  civilized  world,  which 
was  especially  strong  in  England  itself.  Who  does 
not  remember  the  bitter  indictment  of  Miss  Hobb- 
house's  pamphlets?  In  July,  1124  children  died 
from  lack  of  milk;  in  August,  1525;  in  September, 
1964.  Many  Boers  who  lost  their  loved  ones  in 
these  concentration  camps,  and  of  whom  a  striking 
example  is  General  Hertzog,  have  ilever  forgotten 
the  wrongs  inflicted  upon  innocent  non-combatants 
during  those  awful  days. ' 

'  I  was  living  in  London  at  this  time,  and  know  that  the  stories  of 
Miss  Hobbhouse,  W.  T.  Stead,  and  others,  were  accepted  as  true. 
But  Lord  Kitchener,  when  he  finally  left  South  Africa,  did  not 
hesitate  to  state  in  his  farewell  speech:  "The  Commander-in- 
Chief  has  special  pleasure  in  congratulating  the  Army  on  the  kindly 
and  humane  spirit  which  has  animated  all  during  this  long  stnii^gle. 
Fortunately  for  the  future  of  South  Africa,  the  truth  of  this  matter 
is  known  to  our  late  enemy,  as  well  as  to  ourselves;  and  no  misrepre- 
sentation from  outside  can  prevail  in  the  long  run  against  the  actual 
fact  that  no  war  has  ever  yet  been  waged  in  which  combatants  and 
non-combatants  on  either  side  have  shown  so  much  considera- 
tion and  kindness  to  one  another."  The  truth  of  the  matter  is  that 
women  and  children — all  non-combatants  for  that  matter — cannot 
help  suffering  horribly  as  a  result  of  the  invasion  of  the  territory  in 
which  they  live.  If  we  condemn  the  fact  of  invasion,  naturally 
the  responsibility  for  resultant  suffering  and  mortality  falls  upon  the 

46 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


Lord  Milner,  speaking  at  Johannesburg  in  January, 
1902,  declared  that  the  only  possible  way  of  ending 
the  war  was  to  "squeeze"  the  Boers  until  they  made 
overtures  of  their  own  accord.  So  the  Hne  of  block- 
houses was  remorselessly  extended.  Lord  Kitchener 
was  aided  appreciably  in  hastening  the  inevitable 
end  by  enlisting  the  services  of  five  thousand  burghers 
who  had  surrendered.  Under  the  renegade  General 
Vilonel,  these  "National  Scouts"  ("handsuppers, " 
they  were  contemptuously  called  by  the  other  Boers) 
contributed  a  skill  in  guerilla  warfare  and  an  in- 
valuable typographical  knowledge  of  the  country 
to  the  final  efforts  of  the  British  army.  For  the  im- 
mediate purpose  of  finishing  the  war  quickly,  the  use 
of  the  "handsuppers"  was  eminently  successful. 
But  it  resulted  in  a  bitter  feeling,  which  has  persisted 


Government  that  ordered  the  invasion  and  the  army  that  carried 
out  the  order.  But  once  that  is  said,  is  it  not  true  that  suffering 
and  death  cannot  be  prevented,  or  even  always  mitigated,  when 
prevention  or  mitigation  comes  into  conflict  with  military  necessity? 
Lord  Kitchener  spoke  with  a  clear  conscience  as  a  soldier,  whose 
first  duty  was  to  accomplish  his  mission.  Concentration  camps 
and  the  blockhouse  system  resulted  in  the  British  victory.  No 
other  course  of  action  was  possible.  Since  all  the  cattle  had  been 
driven  off  the  farms,  where  could  fresh  milk  have  been  obtained? 
The  children  were  victims  of  the  war.  It  is  not  open  to  doubt  that 
the  British  authorities  did  all  they  could  to  make  the  suffering  and 
mortality  as  light  as  possible.  If  the  concentration  camps  had  not 
been  established,  it  is  probable  that  all  the  women  and  children 
would  have  died.  The  only  direct  responsibility  that  falls  upon  tlie 
army  which  executed  orders  given  to  it  by  the  Home  Government 
is  from  mistakes  of  judgment  in  placing  some  of  the  camps  in  un- 
suitable and  unhealthy  locations.  But  even  here  military  men 
would  argue  that  the  exigencies  of  the  situation  necessitated  the 
establishment  of  the  camps  in  such  places, 

47 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


until  now,  against  the  men  who  sold  out  the  cause. 
The  irreconcilables  among  the  Boers  have  never 
ceased  to  maintain  that  the  treachery  of  the  renegades 
alone  made  possible  British  success.  The  "hands- 
uppers"  were  excommunicated  by  the  Dutch  Re- 
formed Church.  Although  the  ecclesiastical  ban 
was  afterwards  lifted,  they  have  been  considered 
ever  since  as  outcasts  even  by  those  who  are  now 
loyal  British  subjects. 

General  Delarey's  success  in  defeating  and  taking 
prisoner  Lord  Methuen  in  March  was  the  last  victory 
for  the  Boers.  In  fact,  when  Delarey  released  Lord 
Methuen,  in  order  that  he  might  receive  proper 
medical  attention  for  his  wounds,  _Boer  magnanimity 
could  not  be  interpreted  otherwise  than  as  a  confes- 
sion that  power  of  resistance  had  reached  its  end. 
Negotiations  were  begun  on  March  23rd. 

Kitchener  and  Milner  had  unequivocally  stated 
that  the  restoration  of  Boer  independence  was  out 
of  the  question.  But  the  conference  of  burghers, 
which  met  at  Vereeniging  on  May  15th,  made  the 
following  proposals  after  three  days  of  heated  dis- 
cussion: the  relinquishment  of  foreign  relations  and 
embassies;  the  acceptance  of  the  protectorate  of 
Great  Britain;  the  surrender  of  a  portion  of  the 
territory  of  the  South  African  Republic;  and  the 
conclusion  of  a  defensive  treaty  with  Great  Britain 
in  regard  to  South  Africa.  When  Kitchener  and 
Milner  declined  to  discuss  these  proposals,  or  tele- 
graph them  to  Mr.  Chamberlain,  and  dictated  terms 
of  unconditional  surrender  upon  which  the  burghers 
were  to  give  a  plain  yes  or  no  answer,  General  De 

48 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


Wet  urged  the  delegates  to  continue  the  war.  But 
"handsupping"  had  now  become  so  prevalent  that 
common  sense  determined  the  burghers  to  submit 
to  the  inevitable.  As  General  Delarey  put  it,  "If 
the  meeting  insisted  on  a  continuation  of  hostilities 
the  nation  would  be  driven  into  'handsupping';  thus 
the  war  would  end  in  dishonor  and  disgrace."  The 
terms  dictated  by  Great  Britain,  and  accepted  at 
Vereeniging,  contained  ten  stipulations: 

I.  Unconditional  surrender,  and  recognition  of 
Edward  VII.  as  lawful  Sovereign.  2.  Biirghers  in 
the  field  outside  the  limits  of  the  two  former  Repub- 
lics and  all  prisoners  of  war  to  be  returned  to  their 
homes  as  soon  as  transportation  and  means  of  sub- 
sistence made  this  possible.  3.  No  burghers  sur- 
rendering or  returning  to  be  deprived  of  personal 
liberty  or  property.  4.  Immunity  from  legal 
action,  civil  or  criminal,  of  burghers  for  any  acts  in 
connection  with  the  prosecution  of  the  war.  5. 
The  Dutch  language  to  be  taught  in  public  schools, 
where  the  parents  of  the  children  desire  it,  and  to  be 
allowed  in  courts  of  law,  when  necessary  for  the 
better  and  more  effectual  administration  of  justice. 
6.  The  possession  of  rifles,  subject  to  the  taking 
out  of  a  license,  to  be  allowed  to  persons  requiring 
them  for  their  protection.  7.  Military  administra- 
tion to  be  succeeded  by  civil  government  at  the 
earliest  possible  date,  and,  as  soon  as  circumstances 
permitted,  the  introduction  of  representative  in- 
stitutions, leading  up  to  self-government.  8.  The 
question  of  granting  the  franchise  to  natives  not  to 
be  decided  until  after  the  introduction  of  self-govern- 
4  49 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ment.  9.  No  special  tax  to  be  imposed  on  landed 
property  in  the  Transvaal  and  Orange  River  Colony 
to  defray  the  expenses  of  the  war.  10.  The  appoint- 
ment of  a  commission,  on  which  local  inhabitants 
would  be  represented,  for  assisting  the  restoration  of 
the  people  to  their  homes  and  their  rehabilitation, 
and  for  this  purpose  the  granting  of  £3,000,000  to 
compensate  war  losses  suffered  by  the  burghers: 
but  no  foreigner  or  rebel  to  be  entitled  to  the  benefit 
of  this  clause. 

There  were  eighteen  thousand  Boers  left  to  sur- 
render. The  war  had  cost  Great  Britain  twenty-two 
thousand  in  killed  alone. 

Lord  Milner  became  Governor  of  the  Transvaal 
on  June  21st,  and  two  days  later  Lord  Kitchener 
left  South  Africa,  having  accomplished  a  task  which 
proved  conclusively  that  there  had  been  no  mistake 
in  choosing  the  victor  of  Omdurman  to  solve  the 
most  aggravating  military  problem  that  had  ever 
confronted  a  British  general. 

There  may  be  conflicting  opinions,  which  history 
cannot  reconcile,  concerning  the  causes  and  the  jus- 
tice of  Great  Britain's  war  of  conquest  against  the 
Boers.  There  can  be  no  doubt  about  the  benefit 
that  has  resulted  from  it  for  the  Boers  themselves, 
for  the  British  Empire,  and  for  the  whole  world. 

The  Boer  War  marks  a  distinct  step  forward  in 
making  Africa  a  white  man's  country.  If  we  take 
the  attitude  that  the  white  man  should  leave  to 
indigenous  elements  the  territories  they  have  occupied' 
(or,  to  put  it  more  accurately,  partially  occupied) 
from  the  beginning  of  our  knowledge  of  these  terri- 

50 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


tories,  we  deny  that  our  civilization  has  a  right  to 
exist  and  to  prevail.  We  deny  the  logic  and  the 
justice  of  the  forces  that  have  contributed  to  make 
the  world  what  it  is  to-day.  We  deny  that  the  Aryan 
race  has  had  and  still  has  a  mission,  and  that  that 
mission  seems  to  have  been  peculiarly  entrusted 
to  the  Anglo-Saxon  element  of  the  white  race.  The 
process  of  civilization  is  always  painful,  always 
fraught  with  temporary  injustice,  always  prejudicial 
to  the  immediate  interests  of  native  races  which 
refuse  assimilation  and  resist  enlightening  influences. 

If  we  are  going  to  denounce  and  deplore  Anglo- 
Saxon  domination  in  South  Africa,  the  conquest  of 
the  aboriginal  races  on  the  North  American  continent 
and  the  gradual  absorption  of  weaker  European 
elements  by  the  Anglo-Saxon  must  be  denounced 
and  deplored.  When  we  view  and  comment  upon 
events  as  they  happen,  we  are  ashamed  to  hold  that 
the  end  justifies  the  means.  But  when  we  review 
and  judge  events  with  the  perspective  of  years,  is  it 
not  human  nature  to  approve  whatever  has  happened, 
when  the  results  are  unquestionably  beneficial? 

Only  the  man  who  would  like  to  see  Africa  still 
a  "dark  continent,"  completely  out  of  touch  with 
Europe  and  America,  can  indulge  in  destructive 
and  vindictive  criticism  of  European  colonization  in 
Africa.  In  passing  judgment  upon  the  activities  of 
the  different  European  states  in  Africa,  there  is 
only  one  sensible  criterion — the  results.  So  I  have 
refrained  from  going  into  an  appreciation  of  the 
causes  of  the  Boer  War,  and  have  limited  my  account 
of  the  conflict  between  Boer  and  Briton  to  what  was 

51 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


strictly  necessary  in  order  to  introduce  the  work  of 
evolution  that  has  been  going  on  in  South  Africa 
since  1900.  The  same  point  of  view,  the  same 
method  of  treatment  is  adopted  throughout  this 
book. 

If  the  British  Government,  after  the  Boer  War, 
had  tried  to  exterminate  the  Boers,  or  to  assimilate 
them  violently  and  summarily,  if  they  had  denied  to 
the  Boers  either  the  economic  or  political  liberty 
they  had  enjoyed  before,  or  that  which  they  had  a 
right  to  expect  as  British  subjects,  the  Boer  War 
would  rightly  be  considered  as  a  war  of  aggressive 
conquest,  harmful  to  the  interest  of  South  Africans 
of  all  races,  and  would  have  resulted  in  a  decade 
or  more  of  terrorism.  But,  from  the  very  day 
peace  was  signed.  Great  Britain  began  to  work 
constructively  for  the  happiness  and  well-being  of  all 
South  Africans,  irrespective  of  race.  Local  passions 
and  prejudices  tried  to  frustrate  this  typically  Anglo- 
Saxon  ideal.  But  generations  of  experience  and  of 
training,  inbred  with  excellent  tradition,  had  made 
the  British  Government  uncannily  wise  in  judging 
and  dealing  rightly  with  colonial  problems. 

The  first  test  came  immediately  after  the  peace 
of  Vereeniging.  The  British  Cabinet  refused  to  be 
persuaded  by  South  African  "Imperialists"  to 
suspend  the  Cape  Colony  Parliament  on  the  ground 
that  it  would  refuse  to  pass  measures  necessary  for  the 
pacification  of  the  country.  Rather  than  start  in 
upon  the  delicate  task  of  reconciliation  and  recon- 
struction by  adopting  an  unconstitutional  policy 
for  expediency's  sake,  it  was  rightly  believed  to  be 

52 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


better  to  risk  the  overthrow  of  a  ministry  favorable 
to  the  British  Government.  The  Imperialist  or 
Progressive  Opposition  was  guided  by  Dr.  Jameson 
rather  more  wisely  than  his  past  career  would  have 
indicated.  In  the  years  of  reconciliation,  a  great 
deal  is  due  to  the  wonderful  growth,  through  re- 
sponsibility, of  this  man  who  had  led  the  Raid  that 
bears  his  name.  It  is  curious  how  invariably  radicals, 
hotheads,  and  extremists  become  conservative  when 
power  is  placed  in  their  hands.  With  each  suc- 
ceeding year.  Dr.  Jameson  became  more  moderate 
and  charitable,  and  more  able  to  impose  moderation 
on  his  followers,  many  of  whom  advocated  in  the 
press  and  on  the  platform  the  poUcy  of  Prussia  in 
Alsace  and  Lorraine. 

The  problems  that  confronted  the  British  Govern- 
ment in  South  Africa  were  so  many  and  so  complex 
that  Mr.  Chamberlain  decided  in  the  autumn  of 
1902  to  go  to  the  Natal,  Cape,  Transvaal,  and  Orange 
River  Colonies,  so  that  he  might  investigate  the  post- 
bellum  situation  firsthand.  His  ostensible  reason 
was  to  study  the  question  of  introducing  Chinese 
labor  on  the  indenture  system.  When  the  inter- 
rupted work  of  the  mines  in  the  Transvaal  was  re- 
sumed, it  had  been  found  that  only  fifty  thousand 
natives  were  willing  to  work,  although  three  times 
that  number  were  imperatively  needed.  White 
labor  on  an  extensive  scale  was  considered  too  costly. 
But  the  underlying  motive  of  the  Premier's  visit 
was  political  rather  than  economic.  It  was  his 
ambition  to  bring  together  the  Dutch  and  English 
parties  in  Cape  Colony,  to  discuss  frankly  with 

53 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  defeated  Boer  leaders  in  Pretoria  and  Bloem- 
fontein  the  practical  questions  involved  in  recon- 
struction, and  to  appeal  to  the  Dutch  everywhere 
"to  let  bygones  be  bygones." 

During  this  visit  in  the  winter  of  1 902 -1 903,  Mr. 
Chamberlain  found  that  the  settlement  of  the 
South  African  question  had  only  begun  with  the 
Peace  of  Vereeniging.  There  were  all  sorts  of  cur- 
rents, and  cross  currents,  involving  the  parliamentary 
regime  in  Cape  Colony;  the  economic  relations  be- 
tween Natal  and  Cape  Colony  and  the  two  newly 
conquered  colonies,  especially  in  the  way  of  railway 
agreements  and  railway  extensions;  the  introduction 
of  Chinese  labor,  to  which  all  parties  were  opposed 
(the  only  thing  the  British  and  Dutch  were  in  ac- 
cord upon  in  Cape  Colony!);  the  repatriation  of 
the  Boers  upon  the  breaking  up  of  the  concentra- 
tion camps,  return  of  prisoners  and  distribution  of 
the  three  million  pound  grant;  the  settlement  of 
Crown  lands;  and  the  assessing  of  a  war  debt  upon 
the  defeated  republics. 

Mr.  Chamberlain  was  not  sure  that  public  opinion 
in  England  would  receive  favorably  the  proposition 
of  Lord  Milner  to  solve  political  difficulties  by  the 
introduction  of  British  settlers  upon  Crown  land. 
He  found  that  the  difficulty  of  pacification  in  South 
Africa  was  mostly  through  hostility  to  the  National 
Scouts.  The  Boers  insisted  that  it  had  not  been  the 
understanding  that  any  portion  of  the  three  million 
pounds  was  to  go  to  "handsuppers, "  that  any  grants 
to  them  would  be  open  to  the  suspicion  of  payment 
of  promised  bribes  to  traitors  and  renegades,  as 

54 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


the  "handsuppers"  were  regarded.  At  Pretoria,  in 
answer  to  Mr.  Chamberlain's  plea  for  union,  the 
Boers  pressed  for  claims  and  advantages  far  beyond 
what  the  treaty  had  assured  them.  Mr.  Chamberlain 
warned  them  that  future  amnesty  and  self-govern- 
ment would  not  come  through  pressure.  At  Bloem- 
fontein  a  deputation  of  Boers  headed  by  General 
Christian  De  Wet  told  Mr.  Chamberlain  that  there 
were  many  irreconcilables  among  the  Boers,  especially 
in  what  had  been  the  Free  State,  and  complained 
that  the  terms  of  peace  were  not  being  carried  out. 
The  real  trouble  was  animosity  against  the  National 
Scouts.  Mr.  Chamberlain  and  General  De  Wet  both 
lost  their  temper,  and  a  rather  undignified  scene 
followed. 

In  connection  with  the  labor  question,  the  mine- 
owners  of  the  Rand'  declared  to  Mr.  Chamberlain 
that,  as  the  immediate  future  of  South  Africa  de- 
pended upon  the  extension  of  the  gold  industry, 
the  importation  of  indentured  Chinese  was  the  only 
thing  that  could  save  the  situation.  The  possibility 
of  employing  whites,  they  said,  was  out  of  the  ques- 
tion, not  only  on  account  of  the  high  wages  demanded, 
but  because  whites  could  not  do  heavy  manual  work 
in  a  country  inhabited  by  people  of  an  inferior 
race  without  sinking  to  the  economic  level  of  the 
blacks.  Hindoos  were  not  of  the  physical  build 
demanded  for  working  in  mines,  and,  if  imported  in 
large  quantities,  would  end  by  demanding  the  right, 

'  By  the  Rand  is  meant  the  mining  area  from  Spring  to  Rand- 
fontcin,  a  gold  reef  of  thirty  to  forty  miles,  including  Johannesburg 
and  all  the  mining  townships. 

55 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


as  British  subjects,  to  remain.  For  the  blacks,  on 
the  other  hand,  it  was  contended  that  the  scarcity 
of  labor  for  the  mines  was  due  to  the  unwillingness 
of  mine-owners  to  pay  wages  that  would  compete 
with  the  considerably  higher  wages  offered  for  public 
works  and  railway  construction.  The  labor  question 
was  serious,  not  only  from  the  standpoint  of 
the  mine-owners,  but  also  from  the  standpoint  of  the 
entire  white  population  of  the  colony.  Half  the 
stamps  on  the  mines  were  idle  for  lack  of  labor.  As 
the  mines  used  coal  and  furnished  the  principal 
receipts  for  the  railways,  economic  rehabilitation 
and  development  could  not  be  hoped  for  so  long  as 
the  mines  were  not  being  fully  worked.  Unless  this 
question  could  be  solved,  the  Boer  War  would  have 
been  fought  in  vain:  for  upon  the  Transvaal  mines 
depended  the  economic  prosperity  of  the  whole  of 
South  Africa,  and  the  justification  of  extensive  rail- 
way construction,  which  alone  could  develop  the 
agricultural  resources  of  the  four  colonies  and  of 
Rhodesia.  It  was  fruitless  to  talk  of  a  war  loan, 
unless  the  Transvaal  was  put  in  the  position  of 
meeting  the  interest  on  the  loan. 

The  task  of  the  Home  Government  was  compli- 
cated by  conflicting  sentiments  in  the  British  electo- 
rate. There  was  a  universal  feeling  that  the 
tremendous  sacrifice  of  treasure  and  of  blood  made 
by  England  should  not  result  in  an  additional  burden 
on  the  British  taxpayer,  while  trade  with  South 
Africa  (which  had  increased  in  ten  years  from  nine 
million  pounds  to  twenty-six  million  pounds)  was 
diminished.    On  the  other  hand,  the  nonconformist 

56 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


conscience  and  labor  sentiment  were  hostile  to  the 
adoption  of  a  program  in  South  Africa  that  would 
mean  the  infringement  of  personal  Hberty  and  the 
denial  of  the  principles  which  apologists  had  advanced 
in  justification  for  undertaking  the  war.  No  post- 
factum  substantiation  must  be  given  to  the  accusa- 
tion so  often  made  that  the  war  had  been  instigated 
by  and  fought  for  the  mine-owners. 

The  general  result  of  Mr.  Chamberlain's  visit  to 
South  Africa  was  the  adoption  by  the  Imperial 
Government  of  the  only  policy  that  would  avoid 
going  from  Scylla  to  Charybdis.  The  Cabinet 
tried,  with  varying  fortunes  at  first,  but  with  ulti- 
mate success  at  last,  to  base  its  South  African  policy 
upon  the  principle  that  South  African  questions  be 
decided  in  the  final  analysis  by  South  Africans,  and 
that  London  abstain  from  overriding  colonial  wishes 
in  regard  to  colonial  interests.  Extreme  care,  how- 
ever, had  to  be  exercised  in  finding  out  what  really 
was  the  opinion  on  all  these  questions.  Imperialist 
and  Boer  fanatics  did  their  best  to  retard  union, 
although  the  former  thought  they  were  working  for 
it.  For  the  extreme  elements  in  both  parties  tried  to 
make  the  Cabinet  believe  that  they  voiced  the 
sentiments  of  the  people,  and  to  influence  the  Cabinet 
to  decisions  inimical  to  the  real  interests  of  South 
Africa. 

Because  the  years  between  the  treaty  of  Vereenig- 
ing  and  the  estabhshment  of  the  Commonwealth 
developed  problems  that  are  being  faced  or  that  will 
have  to  be  faced  soon  in  all  African  colonies,  it  is 
important  to  set  each  one  of  them  forth  in  more 

57 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


detail  than  would  otherwise  be  justifiable  in  a  book 
whose  scope  includes  the  whole  of  Africa.  Then, 
too,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  formation  of  the 
Commonwealth,  which  could  come  only  after  these 
questions  had  been  for  years  in  the  melting-pot,  is  a 
justification  of  Great  Britain's  role  in  Africa,  and  the 
goal  towards  which  all  the  States  who  are  colonizing 
Africa  must  equally  work. 

For  the  sake  of  avoiding  confusion  and  in  order 
to  make  these  problems  stand  out  beyond  their 
South  African  setting,  I  deal  with  each  one  of  them 
separately,  and  do  not  attempt  to  coordinate  them 
chronologically  between  1902  and  1910. 

THE  MINES  AND  THE  PROBLEM  OF  WHITE,  BLACK,  AND 
CHINESE  LABOR 

The  accusation  against  the  mine-owners  that 
they  were  endeavoring  to  compel  blacks  to  work  for  a 
wage  lower  than  could  be  obtained  in  the  open  market 
does  not  seem  to  be  substantiated  by  the  facts,  I 
have  been  told  by  competent  observers  that  the  failure 
to  secure  native  labor  in  1903  was  mainly  due  to  the 
unsettled  state  of  the  country  and  the  reluctance  of 
the  natives  to  leave  their  krals  until  they  had  con- 
fidence that  order  was  restored.  As  they  had  been 
very  prosperous  du,ring  the  war  and  had  saved  money, 
they  did  not  feel  the  necessity  of  working.  Where  in 
the  world  do  negroes  work  when  they  have  money? 
If  one  bears  in  mind  the  fact  that  the  Rand  enter- 
prises involved  wholly  "  uitlanders, "  and  that  the 
Boers  were  exclusively  agriculturalists,  it  is  possible 

58 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


to  look  for  an  economic  motive  underlying  the 
political  one.  Farmers  who  could  afford  to  give  the 
blacks  ten  shillings  a  month  at  the  most,  regarded 
mines,  with  the  wage  rate  of  two  pounds  fifteen  to 
three  pounds  with  food,  as  the  cause  of  their  in- 
ability to  get  sufficient  labor.  All  along,  since  gold 
was  discovered  in  the  Transvaal  to  the  present  day, 
animosity  against  the  "uitlander"  has  been  kept 
alive  for  this  very  patent  reason.  Far  from  sym- 
pathizing with  the  contention  that  the  mine-owners 
were  willing  to  give  the  blacks  too  little,  the  Boer 
farmers  have  complained  of  the  blacks  being  too  well 
paid.  They  have  frequently  tried  to  get  the  Govern- 
ment to  legislate  in  their  favor,  but  without  success. 

When  it  comes  to  white  labor  versus  black  labor, 
the  cause  of  the  failure  to  run  the  mines  with  white 
labor  is  neither  wages  nor  cHmate.  It  is  a  social 
question.  The  white  man  will  not  work  alongside 
the  black  man.  He  is  physically  able  to  do  as  much, 
if  not  more  work,  than  the  black,  but  he  will  not 
do  the  same  work.  Labor  leaders  in  South  Africa 
have  failed  utterly  in  their  efforts  to  demonstrate 
that  mines  could  be  worked  by  whites,  for  the  simple 
reason  that  white  laborers,  even  when  starving, 
refuse  to  do  "niggers'  work."  White  men  demand 
positions  in  which  there  is  not  hard  manual  labor. 
It  seems  amply  demonstrated  that  there  is  no  place 
in  South  Africa  for  the  white  man  who  has  no  trade, 
and  no  opportunity  to  develop  his  own  land.  The 
poor  white  problem  has  become  acute  in  South 
Africa.  Europeans  without  a  trade  or  commercial 
aptitude,  and  without  money  to  develop  land,  are 

59 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


discouraged  from  coming  into  the  Commonwealth: 
for  the  white  man  who  has  no  other  resource  than  his 
hands  is  apt  to  become  a  charge  upon  the  community 
and  a  menace.  The  South  African  Labor  Party  has 
now  come  to  a  position  where  it  opposes  only  the 
use  of  natives  who  are  brought  into  the  labor  market 
from  outside  the  Commonwealth. 

As  to  the  rate  of  wages  that  it  is  possible  for  mine- 
owners  to  pay,  it  must  be  remembered  that  practically 
all  the  mines  of  the  Rand  are  low  grade  propo- 
sitions, and  are  worked  sometimes  to  a  depth  of 
seven  thousand  feet.  Many  miles  of  reef  are  now 
unworked  because  the  ore  is  too  low  grade  to  yield 
a  profit,  even  at  the  native  rate  of  wages.  Some 
mines  have  paid  nothing  to  their  shareholders  for 
years,  and  others  are  just  above  the  margin  of  pay- 
ability. Even  if  it  be  admitted  that  the  cost  of 
administration  and  the  capitalization  are  in  many 
cases  excessive,  a  slight  increase  of  wages  would 
wipe  out  the  margin  between  profit  and  loss  in  the 
most  carefully  run  and  most  conservatively  capi- 
taUzed  mine. 

The  sentiment  against  the  introduction  of  Chinese 
labor  was  greatly  strengthened  in  England  by  the 
resignation  of  Commissioner  of  Mines  Wyebergh 
and  Mr,  Monypenny,  Editor  of  the  Johannesburg 
Star,  who  had  been  a  brilliant  advocate  of  the  British 
cause  during  the  war.  Mr.  Wyebergh  championed 
the  employment  of  white  unskilled  labor,  denying 
that  it  would  be  impracticable  or  excessively  costly. 
He  charged  that  the  financial  hou'ses  on  the  Rand 
had  unduly  influenced  the  policy  of  the  Government. 

60 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


Mr.  Monypenny  refused  to  use  his  pen  "in  the 
interest  of  the  mine-owners."  There  were  un- 
doubtedly two  sides  to  the  question,  but  when 
one  tries  to  view  it  from  the  standpoint  of  the  immedi- 
ate interest  of  the  Transvaal,  takes  into  consideration 
the  safeguards  that  it  was  proposed  to  put  around  the 
introduction  of  this  new  element  into  South  Africa, 
and  remembers  that  Chinese  labor  was  proposed  only 
temporarily  as  an  experiment,  it  is  difBcuit  to  understand 
the  strong  opposition  that  the  suggestion  aroused. 

In  the  beginning  of  1904,  when  Lord  Milner  saw 
that  the  Transvaal  and  Orange  River  Colony  budgets 
were  going  to  have  a  deficit  of  nearly  seven  hundred 
thousand  pounds,  he  cabled  to  London  for  permission 
to  introduce  an  ordinance  to  enforce  Chinese  labor, 
stating  that  opposition  to  such  a  measure  was  dying 
down,  and  declaring  that  white  men  would  leave  the 
Transvaal  if  it  were  not  done.  The  Legislative 
Council  passed  the  ordinance,  and  royal  assent  was 
published  on  March  12th.  The  first  shipload  of  one 
thousand  coolies  sailed  from  Hongkong  on  May 
5th.  AustraHa  cabled  a  protest  to  London.  Public 
opinion  in  Cape  Colony  was  frankly  hostile.  The 
influential  Boers  signed  a  statement  to  the  effect 
that  the  overwhelming  majority  of  Boers  was  un- 
alterably opposed  to  the  introduction  of  Asiatics 
under  whatever  conditions.  Boer  opposition,  how- 
ever, as  one  can  gather  from  the  statement  of  General 
Botha,  was  largely  duje  to  the  fact  that  they  believed 
such  a  step  should  not  be  taken  before  the  responsible 
Government  promised  by  the  Treaty  of  Vereeniging 
had  been  granted. 

61 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


At  the  beginning  of  1905,  there  were  35,000  Chinese 
on  the  Rand  and  by  the  end  of  July  the  number  had 
increased  to  43,000.  Strikes  and  assassinations  in 
the  compounds  were  followed  by  many  Chinese 
breaking  loose.  White  women  were  attacked. 
Then  the  Boers  demanded  of  Lord  Selborne  that  they 
be  permitted  to  carry  arms  in  defence  against  the 
Chinese,  and  that  the  immigration  cease.' 

The  Chinese  claimed  that  they  had  been  imposed 
upon,  and  did  not  realize  that  they  were  coming  to 
Africa  to  be  virtual  prisoners. 

Immediately  after  the  fall  of  the  Balfour  Cabinet 
in  December,  1905,  Lord  Elgin  ordered  by  cable  the 
stopping  of  the  importation  of  Chinese,  pending 
the  decision  to  grant  responsible  government  to  the 
colony.  During  that  year,  a  thousand  Chinese  had 
already  been  repatriated  for  violation  of  contract 
or  disorderly  conduct.  Repatriation  continued  in 
1907  and  1908,  as  indentures  expired.  By  the  end 
of  July,  1908,  only  five  thousand  were  left,  and  the 
last  left  early  in  1910. 

If  the  intention  of  the  experiment  of  Chinese  labor 
was  merely  to  set  the  wheels  of  industry  working 
quickly  so  that  the  country  could  pay  its  way  (as 

» The  Boers  were  really  in  favor  of  Chinese  labor,  though  for 
sentimental  reasons  they  professed  not  to  be.  Chinese  recruitment 
for  the  mines  enabled  the  Boers  to  get  cheap  Kaffir  labor  for  the 
farms,  which  they  never  could  do  in  competition  with  the  mines. 
There  was  actually  a  proposal  made  in  Parliament  by  a  Transvaal 
member  in  19 13  to  re-introduce  Chinese  labor  for  the  mines  on  the 
ground  that  it  would  help  the  farmers  to  get  Kaffir  labor  cheaper 
than  was  then  possible.  It  found  universal  support  among  the 
Transvaal  farmers. 

62 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


practically  the  whole  revenue  of  the  Transvaal  was 
derived  directly  or  indirectly  from  the  mines),  the 
experiment  was  far  from  being  a  failure.  Its  warmest 
supporters  had  not  tried  to  defend  it,  or  to  establish 
it  as  a  permanent  institution. 

INDIAN  COLONIST  RIGHTS  'aND  INDIAN  IMMIGRATION 

A  bitter  grievance  of  the  British  press  against  the 
Kruger  administration  had  been  its  treatment  of 
Indian  British  subjects.  The  British  Government's 
technical  ground  for  coming  into  open  conflict 
with  the  Transvaal  Government  was  the  violation 
of  the  London  Convention.  For  disabilities  were 
imposed  upon  British  Indians  as  to  residence  and 
freedom  to  pursue  their  legitimate  callings  in  the 
Transvaal.  But  after  the  Boer  War  the  treatment 
of  British  Indians  was  not  remedied.  Facts  were  laid 
before  ParUament  to  show  that  rights  enjoyed  under 
Kruger  had  actually  been  curtailed  by  the  new 
British  administration!  In  1904  the  Government 
of  India  made  a  formal  protest.  Parliament  was 
reminded  of  the  old  grievance  against  Kruger, 
and  how  the  thesis  at  that  time  had  been  adopted 
by  the  British  Government  in  dealing  with  the 
Transvaal,  that  the  London  Convention  applied  to 
all  British  subjects,  irrespective  of  race,  creed,  color, 
or  language,  so  that  Indians  had  the  right  to  enter, 
travel,  or  reside  in  any  part  of  the  Transvaal,  without 
restrictions. 

There  has  been  no  difference  between  Kruger's 
treatment  of  the  Indians  and  that  of  the  Government 

63 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


which  ousted  him.  No  protest  from  Calcutta,  even 
when  backed  by  London  and  the  press,  had  any  effect. 
Upon  this  question  there  is  perfect  solidarity  between 
English  and  Dutch  in  South  Africa.  The  thesis  of 
South  Africa  is  that  unrestricted  right  of  entry  to 
Indians  will  lower  the  whole  standard  of  living  for 
the  white  man  and  make  his  existence  in  the  country 
impossible.  It  is  the  same  thesis  as  is  adopted 
regarding  Asiatic  immigration  by  California  and  our 
other  western  States,  by  Canada  and  by  Australia. 
It  has  extended  to  the  European  settlers  of  British 
East  Africa.  Questions  of  justice,  fair  play,  higher 
considerations  of  national  interest  fall  on  deaf 
ears  when  the  Anglo-Saxon  is  asked  to  let  in  the 
Asiatic.  He  simply  will  not  do  it.  There  is  no 
argument.  Only  those  who  are  far  away  from  the 
"yellow  peril"  and  who  would  not  be  affected  them- 
selves by  unrestricted  Asiatic  immigration  espouse  the 
cause  of  Japanese,  Chinese,  and  Indians.  I  am  not 
approving  or  condemning.    I  simply  state  the  fact. 

After  nine  years  of  futile  protest,  the  British 
Viceroy  in  India  decided  to  give  up  the  struggle. 
All  that  is  asked  for  now  is  liberal  treatment  of  the 
Indian  already  in  the  country.  The  South  African 
Commonwealth,  no  more  than  Kruger,  has  not  ac- 
cepted the  London  Convention.  Nor  will  it  ever  do 
so. 

THE  TRANSVAAL'S  WAR  "CONTRIBUTION" 

One  great  question  which  Mr.  Chamberlain  went 
to  South  Africa  "to  settle"  was  the  financial  situa- 

64 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


tion  of  the  new  colonies.  He  announced  at  Johannes- 
burg that  the  Imperial  Government  would  submit 
to  Parliament  a  bill  to  guarantee  a  loan  of  thirty- 
five  million  pounds  sterUng,  secured  by  the  assets 
of  the  Transvaal  and  Orange  River  colonies,  to  pay 
existing  debts  of  the  former  governments,  to  provide 
for  expenditures  for  public  works,  land  settlements, 
and  new  railways.  There  could  be  no  reasonable 
opposition  to  this  bill.  For  it  was  imperative  to  put 
a  firm  financial  foundation  as  soon  as  possible  under 
the  new  colonies,  and  to  make  possible  the  develop- 
ment of  the  territories  through  Government  initiative. 
This  was  to  the  interest  of  all  the  inhabitants  of  the 
colonies. 

But  when  Mr.  Chamberlain  added  that  a  second 
loan  of  thirty  million  pounds  would  be  floated,  to  be 
considered  as  a  war  debt  secured  on  the  assets  of  the 
Transvaal,  for  the  purpose  of  paying  the  conquerors 
a  portion  of  the  expenditure  of  the  conquest,  and  that 
the  first  ten  million  pounds  of  this  loan  was  to  be 
taken  up  by  local  mine  owners,  a  howl  of  protest  was 
raised  that  never  ceased.  The  Boers  maintained 
that  their  future  could  not  be  mortgaged  in  this 
way,  and  pointed  out  that  the  question  of  a  war 
contribution  was  not  mentioned  in  the  stipulations 
of  the  Treaty  of  Vereeniging,  and  was  contrary  to  the 
spirit,  if  not  to  the  text,  of  Article  9.  They  said  only 
that  if  Great  Britain  thought  it  worth  while  to  under- 
take a  war,  which  had  not  been  of  their  seeking,  in 
order  to  conquer  them,  it  was  up  to  the  British  to 
foot  the  bill,  and  look  for  compensation  in  pride  over 


5 


65 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  extension  of  their  sovereignty  and  in  profit  from 
the  development  of  their  trade. 

When  it  came  to  floating  the  first  ten  milHon 
pound  installment  of  the  Transvaal  war  loan,  Lord 
Milner  realized  that  the  colony  was  in  no  position 
to  pay  the  interest  even  on  this  one-third.  He  let 
London  know  clearly  how  much  he  feared  the  result 
of  the  imposition  of  this  obligation.  He  felt  strongly 
that  the  dissatisfaction  resulting  among  the  Boers 
would  be  a  serious  obstacle  to  reconciHation  and 
reconstruction.  The  agitation  was  great  at  that 
moment  against  the  Chinese  Immigration  Bill,  So 
the  British  Government  decided  to  postpone  the 
measure. 

At  a  congress  in  1905,  General  Botha,  speaking 
against  the  provisions  of  the  proposed  constitution, 
declared  that  ten  capitalists  had  imposed  a  war  loan 
upon  the  people  without  their  consent.  A  day  of 
humiliation  and  prayer  was  appointed  in  the  Dutch 
churches.  When  responsible  government  was  finally 
granted  to  the  Transvaal,  Great  Britain  wisely 
decided  to  forego  entirely  the  war  contribution 
arranged  by  Mr.  Chamberlain  with  the  mining  mag- 
nates. Whenever  it  is  a  question  of  colonial  prob- 
lems, common  sense  eventually  wins  every  time  in 
British  Cabinet  councils.  They  knew  well  that 
one  of  the  first  acts  of  the  Transvaal  Government 
would  be  to  repudiate  the  debt.  They  were 
happy  enough  to  see  the  way  clear  to  a  solution  of 
the  Transvaal  problem  without  borrowing  trouble 
over  the  question  of  a  few  million  pounds. 

66 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


GRANTING     RESPONSIBLE     GOVERNMENT     TO  THE 
TRANSVAAL  AND  THE  ORANGE  FREE  STATE 

We  have  spoken  of  the  wise  decision  of  the  Home 
Government  to  resist  the  demand  of  the  extreme 
EngHsh  party  in  Cape  Colony  for  suspension  of  the 
Colonial  Parliament  on  the  ground  that  it  would 
refuse  to  pass  measures  necessary  for  the  pacification 
of  the  country,  and  also  of  the  representations  made 
to  Mr.  Chamberlain  at  the  time  of  his  visit  to  the 
Transvaal  and  the  Free  State  during  the  winter  after 
the  Treaty  of  Vereeniging  was  signed.  Mr.  Chamber- 
lain told  the  Boers  that  the  British  Government 
and  the  British  people  were  in  entire  sympathy 
with  the  principle  of  self-government,  and  that  the 
promise  of  the  Treaty  of  Vereeniging  concerning  the 
establishment  of  responsible  government  would  be 
fulfilled  at  the  earliest  possible  moment.  But  he 
warned  the  Boers  that  agitation  and  pressure  would 
retard  rather  than  hasten  the  day  when  responsible 
government  would  be  granted. 

Mr.  Chamberlain's  warning  might  have  come 
true  had  the  Conservative  Cabinet  remained  firmly 
in  power,  and  had  not  the  advocates  of  the  union  of 
the  South  African  colonies  felt  that  delaying  re- 
sponsible government  menaced  the  success  of  their 
plan. 

From  the  very  beginning  the  Boers  did  agitate 
for  responsible  government,  and  they  brought  pres- 
sure to  bear — unrest  and  racial  animosity  in  the 
Transvaal  and  the  Free  State,  political  manoeuvering 
in  the  Cape  Parliament,  economic  threats  in  Natal, 

67 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


and  a  powerful  sentimental  propaganda  in  England. 
When  one  reads  the  history  of  the  years  between 
the  end  of  the  Boer  War  and  the  downfall  of  the 
Chamberlain-Balfour  Ministry,  and  wades  through 
the  mass  of  polemical  literature  on  both  sides,  he 
marvels  at  the  courage  of  the  decision  to  give  in  to 
the  Boers  on  this  question  when  they  were  still 
showing  themselves  bitter  and  intractable.  The 
Boers  did  not  want  responsible  government  under 
the  terms  granted  to  them — it  had  to  be  all  their  way 
or  no  way  at  all.  The  decision  to  give  responsible 
government  is  a  notable  proof  of  the  intuitive  genius 
of  the  British  as  empire-builders. 

The  Boer  agitation  in  both  the  conquered  republics 
had  much  to  feed  upon,  and  was  skillful  in  grouping 
itself  around  questions  concerning  which  there  was 
the  strongest  sort  of  public  sentiment  in  England. 
In  the  stand  they  took  on  some  of  these  "moral 
issues,"  the  Boers  were  undoubtedly  insincere. 
They  were  making  a  bid  for  support  in  England. 
They  opposed  the  introduction  of  Chinese  labor; 
the  imposition  of  the  war  loan ;  what  they  called  the 
running  of  the  country  by  the  mine-owners;  Mr. 
Chamberlain's  scheme  to  increase  the  taxation  of 
blacks  in  order  to  make  them  work;  the  sacrifice  of 
agricultural  interests  to  mining  interests;  the  dis- 
crimination against  their  language;  the  quartering 
of  a  big  garrison  upon  them;  and  the  "mulcting"  of 
the  Transvaal,  especially  in  the  matter  of  railways, 
to  help  Cape  Colony  and  Natal.  Many  of  the  claims 
and  assertions  of  the  Boers  were  untrue.  But  they 
won  the  electorate  in  England  at  a  moment  when 

68 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


Liberalism,  the  Labor  party,  and  the  nonconformist 
conscience  were  coming  to  their  own.  Nothing  is 
more  admirable  in  the  world  than  the  intuitive 
response  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  to  an  appeal  for  "fair 
play."  Anglo-Saxon  public  opinion,  for  fear  that  it 
might  not  be  "playing  the  game,"  demands  that 
Government  officials  lean  over  backwards  in  order  to 
do  the  square  thing  by  a  vanquished  foe. 

The  detailed  history  of  the  local  struggle  from 
the  end  of  1902  to  the  end  of  1905  is  not  material. 
We  need  only  to  give  the  result.  A  step  was  made 
towards  changing  the  post-bellum  regime  in  the 
Transvaal  early  in  1905,  before  the  Conservatives 
had  to  quit  the  Government.  On  December  22, 
1905,  the  new  Liberal  Colonial  Secretary,  Lord  Elgin 
ordered  by  cable  the  suspension  of  Chinese  labor, 
importation,  "pending  the  decision  by  the  Imperial 
Government  as  to  the  grant  of  responsible  govern- 
ment to  the  Transvaal  Colony."  In  fairness  to  the 
Conservative  Cabinet,  one  must  say  that  they  had 
every  reason  to  feel  perplexed  during  the  summer 
and  autumn  of  1905.  For  the  Boers,  moderates 
and  extremists,  were  united  in  demanding  that  the 
Free  State  should  receive  responsible  government 
at  the  same  time  as  the  Transvaal,  and  in  main- 
taining that  the  constitution  proposed  for  the  Trans- 
vaal by  the  Orders  in  Council  of  March  31,  1905, 
was  unsatisfactory  in  many  of  its  details,  and  in  its 
entirety  "a  breach  of  the  terms  of  peace."  One  of 
the  principal  objections — and  in  this  the  Boers  were 
perfectly  right — was  that  the  j^roposed  constitution 
did  not  exclude  from  the  franchise  the  Army  of 

69 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Occupation.  The  soldiers  were  contemptuously  re- 
ferred to  in  the  Boer  protests  as  "hired  foreigners." 
General  Botha,  upon  whom  Englishmen  of  clear 
head  and  foresight  were  already  placing  their  hopes 
of  the  future,  denounced  the  constitution.  He 
claimed  that  the  Free  State  had  been  a  party  to 
the  Treaty  of  Vereeniging  on  equal  terms  with  the 
Transvaal,  and  that  ten  capitalists  had  more  in- 
fluence with  the  British  Government  than  all  the 
inhabitants  of  the  Transvaal  Colony. 

Throughout  the  year  1906 — the  first  year  of  Liberal 
Government  in  England — the  agitation  waxed  strong. 
Some  Boers  left  for  the  Argentine,  and  others  began 
to  trek  to  East  Africa.  General  Beyers,  campaigning 
for  Het  Volk, '  said:  "The  tree  chopped  at  Vereeni- 
ging is  sprouting  again.  A  people  bound  together 
by  blood  and  tears  cannot  be  lost."  The  contention 
of  Mr.  Lyttleton,  who  drafted  the  constitution,  was 
that  self-government  meant  party  government, 
and  that  if  party  government  were  conducted  along 
racial  lines,  the  result  would  be  disastrous.  The  fact 
that  the  mining  interests  were  lobbying  in  London  for 
the  support  of  the  constitution  in  its  original  form 
alienated  rather  than  gained  English  advocates. 

The  British  Government  gave  in  on  the  provisions 

» Het  Volk  (the  people)  was  the  name  of  a  newspaper  published 
in  Pretoria  long  before  the  war.  The  political  organization  of  that 
name  was  the  party  in  the  Transvaal  which  began  to  agitate  for 
responsible  government  immediately  after  the  Treaty  of  Vereeni- 
ging, and  whicli  later  spread  to  the  other  colonies.  Het  Volk  is 
frequently  used  as  a  general  term  to  describe  the  Boer  party  in 
politics. 

70 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


allowing  British  garrisons  to  vote  and  directing  that 
English  alone  be  used  in  debates.  The  mihtary 
were  excluded,  and  parliamentary  procedure  was 
made  bilingual.  It  also  yielded  in  the  matter  of  the 
Free  State  self-govemment.  Responsible  govern- 
ment was  granted  to  the  Transvaal  on  December  6, 
1906,  and  eleven  days  later  Parliament  was  told 
that  the  Free  State  also  would  receive  responsible 
government.  The  Free  State  was  granted  a  con- 
stitution on  June  5,  1907. 

The  first  elections  under  the  constitution  were  held 
in  the  Transvaal  in  January,  1907.  Het  Volk  won. 
A  Johannesburg  newspaper  declared  that  the  cabinet 
would  be  almost  an  exact  replica  of  the  staff  of  the 
Boer  army.  It  was  not  quite  that:  but  General 
Botha  was  Premier  and  General  Smuts,  Colonial 
Secretary.  Although  the  local  Enghsh  residents, 
blinded  by  prejudice,  could  not  see  it,  the  begin- 
ning of  responsible  government  under  such  splendid 
leaders  pointed  to  a  future  which  was  realized  in  a 
most  remarkable  way  in  1914.  General  Botha  sent 
a  message  to  the  EngUsh  people  in  defense  of  Het 
Volk,  He  declared  that  the  Boers  could  not  forget 
the  generosity  and  the  token  of  confidence  of  the 
British  nation  in  granting  them  responsible  govern- 
ment, and  said  that  the  question  of  the  flag  and 
sovereignty  had  been  settled  for  all  time. 

In  November,  1907,  the  Dutch  party  gained  a 
sweeping  victory  in  the  first  Orange  Free  State 
elections.  Thirteen  of  the  thirty-eight  members  of 
Parliament  were  returned  unopposed  by  Het  Volk. 
There  was  no  racial  conflict  outside  of  Bloemfontein. 

71 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  Dutch  gained  all  except  eight  seats  in  Parlia- 
ment. Both  in  the  Transvaal  and  in  the  Free  State, 
the  Dutch  pronounced  themselves  in  favor  of  federa- 
tion. But  in  the  Free  State  they  were  much  more 
extreme  and  jealous  on  the  question  of  the  main- 
tenance of  the  Taal  language.  The  Free  State 
Boers  were  also  determined  that  in  the  future  South 
African  Commonwealth,  Cape  Colony  should  not 
give  the  natives  right  to  vote,  and  Natal  should 
withhold  the  franchise  from  coolies  and  other 
Asiatics. 

In  the  general  election  of  1908,  the  Dutch  party 
in  Cape  Colony  secured  a  working  majority.  This 
made  the  Dutch  supreme  in  three  colonies.  The 
Dutch  of  Cape  Colony  were  quite  at  one  with  the 
Opposition  under  Dr.  Jameson  in  desiring  federation. 
In  spite  of  the  almost  universal  condemnation  of  the 
policy  by  English  residents  of  South  Africa,  granting 
responsible  government  to  the  former  Republics 
was  from  the  first  a  success.  How  it  has  worked 
out  is  told  in  a  later  chapter. 

THE  TAAL  AGAINST  ENGLISH  IN  THE  SCHOOLS 

Nations  cling  to  their  language  because  they  feel 
that  language  is  the  sign  of  nationality.  As  one 
speaks,  so  one  thinks;  as  one  thinks,  so  one  is.  Great 
nations,  strong  and  advanced  and  numerous,  prove 
their  belief  in  the  essential  importance  of  language 
by  the  efforts  they  make  as  individuals  and  small 
communities,  when  surrounded  by  foreigners,  to 

72 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


maintain  their  language  and  pass  it  on  as  a  precious 
heritage  to  their  children.  They  prove  it  by  the 
efforts  they  make  as  governments  to  ground  and 
solidify  their  poHtical  influence  in  their  possessions 
by  spreading  their  language  as  rapidly  as  possible 
among  subject  races.  Small  nations  demonstrate 
their  belief  in  the  national  importance  of  language 
by  the  almost  insane  pride  and  jealousy  they  show 
in  defense  of  their  tongue.  Subject  races  put  their 
faith  in  language  as  the  medium  for  awakening  and 
sustaining  national  feeling,  and  keeping  alive  hopes 
of  future  emancipation.  Is  it  to  be  wondered  at, 
then,  that  the  Dutch  have  put  the  language  ques- 
tion first  and  foremost  in  their  political  program 
in  South  Africa?  Are  they  to  be  blamed  or  to  be 
denounced  as  fanatics  because  they  hold  dear  to  the 
living  tangible  sign  that  binds  them  to  the  past  in 
the  land  which  their  fathers  colonized  and  conse- 
crated by  their  blood? 

The  Anglo-Saxon  is  at  his  worst — is  insufferable 
even — when  he  is  engaged  in  controversies  where 
his  tongue  is  involved.  He  simply  cannot  see  the 
other  man's  point  of  view,  and  he  does  not  want  to 
see  it.  He  believes  that  he  has  the  best  language 
God  ever  made  just  as  firmly  as  he  believes  that  his 
is  the  best  race  God  ever  made.  We  have  a  perfect 
right  to  our  opinion  (I  say  we  because  I  am  Anglo- 
Saxon  by  blood  and  tradition  just  as  much  as  any 
Englishman),  but  have  we  a  right  to  become  im- 
patient at  and  get  angry  with  and  look  contemptu- 
ously upon  the  man  who  does  not  agree  with  us  for 
the  very  good  reason  that  he  is  not  one  of  us  ? 

73 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


From  the  day  the  Treaty  of  Vereeniging  was 
signed,  the  language  question  received  far  more 
prominence  than  it  ought  to  have  had.  In  standing 
by  his  language,  and  insisting  that  it  should  be 
preserved  in  legislative  assemblies  and  courts  and 
schools,  the  Boer  was  acting  by  the  instinct  that 
moves  every  man.  He  was  led  to  make  it  a  great 
and  bitter  political  issue,  and  to  believe  that  it 
loomed  up  as  the  most  important  thing  on  the 
political  horizon,  because  of  the  lack  of  considera- 
tion of  the  English  element  in  South  Africa.  Instead 
of  sympathizing  with  the  Boer  in  his  outspoken 
expression  of  a  natural  instinct,  his  language  was 
ridiculed  and  his  motive  for  maintaining  it  inter- 
preted as  purely  political,  with  something  sinister 
in  it  and  subversive  of  pubUc  peace.  The  attitude 
of  the  English  in  South  Africa  (fortunately  not  offi- 
cials representing  the  Home  Government,  but  English 
residents)  toward  the  Boers  on  the  language  question 
has  been  exactly  the  same  as  the  attitude  of  the 
Prussians  and  Russians  toward  the  Poles. 

There  is  not  space  to  go  into  a  history  of  the 
conflict  over  the  language  question.  It  is  very 
much  the  same  as  that  which  one  finds  in  many 
parts  of  Europe  to-day,  and  has  the  usual  features: 
espousal  of  the  subject  language  by  the  Church; 
establishment  of  schools  supported  by  private  sub- 
scription, and  taught  largely  by  the  clergy;  refusal 
to  use  the  alien  language  in  courts  and  public  assemb- 
lies; insistence  upon  the  retention  of  the  subject 
language  in  public  schools;  establishment  of  institu- 
tions of  higher  education — even  to  universities— 

74 


THE  BOER  WAR  AXD  RECONSTRUCTION 


where  the  medium  prescribed  is  the  native  lan- 
guage. 

As  in  everything  else  in  South  Africa,  the  extremists 
on  both  sides  failed  to  carry  the  day.  Imperturbable 
in  the  face  of  bitter  criticism,  High  Commissioners 
refused  to  embody  in  reports  to  London  the  assertions 
of  the  Imperialists  that  the  Boers  were  plotting 
treason  through  their  soUcitude  for  their  native 
tongue,  and  the  Home  Government  refused  to  give 
credence  to  these  assertions  when  they  came  through 
other  sources.  The  greatest  credit  in  finding  a 
modus  vivendi  is  due  to  moderate  Boer  leaders,  who 
braved  the  criticism  of  their  own  followers  in  the 
determination  to  follow  a  fair  and  intelligent  policy 
in  the  relation  of  the  two  languages.  The  result 
has  been  as  satisfactory  as  can  be  expected  under  the 
exceedingly  difficult  and  deUcate  circumstances  of 
two  races  hving  side  by  side,  neither  of  which  is 
very  good  at  reconciling  itself  to  the  idea  of  "live 
and  let  Uve." 

The  Taal  is  used  throughout  the  Union  as  the  sole 
medium  for  instruction,  ij  it  is  the  mother  language, 
for  the  first  two  or  three  years.  Then  EngHsh  is 
introduced  as  a  language,  not  as  a  medium.  In  the 
towns,  English  is  the  medium  because  it  is  the 
piother  language  of  the  majority  of  the  children, 
and  Dutch  is  optional  and  taught  as  a  language. 
Boer  children  when  they  leave  school  now  under- 
stand English,  if  they  have  gone  through  the  sec- 
ondary school  course.  English  has  gained  greatly 
everywhere  in  Dutch-speaking  communities.  Al- 
though Dutch  pastors  foster  the  Taal,  they  cannot, 

75 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


except  in  the  "backwoods  districts, "  oppose  English. 
For  in  so  doing  they  would  fatally  militate  against 
the  possibility  of  higher  education,  which  is  not 
obtainable  in  the  Taal.  And  the  maintenance  of 
Boer  supremacy  in  South  Africa  depends  wholly  upon 
the  higher  education  of  the  younger  Boers.  The 
danger  from  remaining  ignorant  is  greater  than  the 
danger  of  becoming  denationalized  through  higher 
education. 

In  considering  the  movement  to  make  the  Taal 
a  language  for  secondary  and  higher  education,  it 
must  be  remembered  that  this  patois,  with  its  large 
admixture  of  Kaffir  and  English  words,  is  unfortun- 
ately not  enough  akin  to  Dutch  to  make  possible 
the  borrowing  of  Dutch  literature  and  the  use  of 
Dutch  text-books.  Having  no  extensive  literature, 
and  the  Afrikanders  being  without  the  financial 
means  and  energy  and  ability  to  make  text-books 
in  Taal  for  more  than  primary  classes,'  it  is  easily 
seen  that  secondary  education  is  impossible  for  the 
Afrikanders  unless  they  learn  some  foreign  language. 
As  their  fortunes  are  now  cast  in  with  the  English, 
it  is  only  common  sense  that  secondary  and  higher 
education  be  in  the  English  language.  It  is  just  as 
hard  for  the  Afrikander  to  learn  good  Dutch  as  to 
learn  good  English.  He  has  a  thousand  uses  for 
English,  and  a  wealth  of  literature  to  draw  upon. 
Learning  Dutch,  then,  which  he  never  has  a  chance 
to  use  and  whose  literature  is  comparatively  cir- 
cumscribed, is  sentimental  folly — a  protest  that  is 
a  boomerang,  reacting  upon  him  against  his  best 
interests. 

76 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


CONFLICTING     LOCAL     INTERESTS     OF  CONTIGUOUS 
COLONIES  UNDER  THE  SAME  FLAG  HASTEN 
UNION 

In  colonies  where  the  European  population,  outside 
of  military  and  civil  ofl&cials,  is  very  small,  the 
interests  of  contiguous  colonies  under  the  same  flag 
are  easily  adjusted.  The  French  and  British  in 
their  West  African  colonies,  and  the  British  in  ar- 
ranging the  boundaries  and  economic  interests  of 
East  Africa,  Uganda,  and  the  Sudan,  had  Uttle 
difficulty.  Decisions  were  made  in  Paris  and 
London,  and  the  colonists  had  no  say  in  the  matter. 
If  advice  was  asked,  it  was  not  necessarily  followed. 
France  brought  her  West  African  colonies  under  a 
common  administrative  control  by  a  Presidential 
Decree.  Great  Britain  incorporated  Lagos  in  Nigeria 
and  later  joined  Northern  and  Southern  Nigeria,  by 
Orders  in  Council.  French  Equatorial  Africa  had 
to  cede  large  and  important  parts  of  her  territory'  to 
Germany  on  word  from  Paris.  Great  Britain  de- 
prived Gambia  and  Nigeria  of  hinterland  for  the 
sake  of  making  a  good  bargain  with  France  over 
matters  that  concerned  neither  of  these  colonies. 
In  South  Africa  the  situation  was  totally  different. 
Here  the  colonists  were  so  numerous  that  they  had 
to  be  let  alone  to  settle  their  own  affairs. 

Long  before  the  Boer  War,  there  was  friction 
between  Natal  and  Cape  Colony  over  many  matters, 
but  principally  over  the  carrying  trade  with  the  two 
Dutch  republics.  WTien  the  Orange  Free  State  and 
the  Transvaal  became  British  colonies,  the  conflict 

77 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


of  local  interests,  instead  of  being  remedied,  became 
more  acute.  To  add  to  the  difficulties  of  the  Home 
Government,  Rhodesia,  now  contiguous  British 
territory  on  the  north  and  very  rapidly  developing, 
had  interests  that  conflicted  in  many  ways  with  the 
four  British  colonies  in  the  south. 

One  illustration  alone  will  suffice  to  show  the 
particularism  of  the  colonies,  the  judicious  restraint 
exercised  by  the  British  Cabinet  in  adopting  a  strict 
non-interv^ention  policy,  and  the  lesson  forcibly 
taught  that  safety  and  strength  for  the  future  to  all 
the  colonies  lay  in  union  alone. 

The  shortest  haul  from  the  Rand  mines  in  the 
Transvaal  to  the  sea  was  through  Portuguese  East 
Africa  to  the  port  of  Lorenzo  Marques  on  Delagoa 
Bay.  Portuguese  territory  formed  the  entire  western 
and  seaward  boundary  of  the  Transvaal.  From 
Portuguese  territory  the  Transvaal  recruited  annu- 
ally an  essential  amount  of  native  labor.  When 
Lord  Milner,  on  December  i8,  1901,  signed  with  the 
Governor  of  Portuguese  East  Africa  a  temporary 
agreement,  maintaining  the  former  treaties  between 
Portugal  and  the  Transvaal  Republic,  he  took  the 
only  course  possible  under  the  circumstances.  The 
surrender  of  the  Boers  was  a  matter  of  months. 
For  the  rehabilitation  of  the  Transvaal  all  the  rail- 
way outlets  to  the  coast  were  necessary,  especially 
this  shortest  one  through  Portuguese  territory;  and 
the  Transvaal  would  need  all  the  labor  it  could 
recniit  from  every  source.  Lord  Milner  bound  the 
new  colony  in  general  to  the  terms  established  in 
1875  for  traffic  between  the  Transvaal  and  Lorenzo 

78 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


Marques.  The  former  tariffs  were  maintained; 
equal  treatment  in  the  Transvaal  for  merchandise 
coming  from  Lorenzo  Marques  with  that  entering 
by  Cape  Colony  and  Natal  ports;  obligation  to 
furnish  to  the  Portuguese  railway  a  fixed  amount  of 
freight  every  day;  appHcation  to  civil  traffic  from 
Lorenzo  Marques  to  the  Transvaal  of  the  same 
principles  and  rules  which  govern  the  traffic  of 
similar  character  coming  from  the  Cape  and  from 
Natal ;  alcohol  and  liquors  not  to  be  taxed  more  than 
if  they  came  from  the  Cape  and  from  Natal ;  freedom 
of  recruiting  native  labor  for  the  Transvaal  in  Portu- 
guese territor}^  and  right  of  the  Portuguese  authorities 
to  supervise  at  Pretoria  and  Johannesburg  the  ful- 
fillment of  the  contracts  entered  into  with  natives 
thus  recruited. 

The  Lorenzo  IMarques  Railway  had  reached  the 
Transvaal  frontier  only  in  1890  and  Pretoria  in  1894. 
Before  that  time  the  Cape  and  Natal  railways  had 
a  monopoly  of  imports  to  and  exports  from  the 
Transvaal.  The  profits  were  very  great,  and  the 
two  colonies  had  only  each  other  as  rivals.  Between 
the  time  the  Portuguese  railway  was  opened  and 
the  outbreak  of  the  Boer  War,  the  Cape  Railway 
saw  its  carrj'ing  trade  with  the  Transvaal  reduced 
from  eighty  per  cent,  of  the  total  trade  to  thirty- 
seven  per  cent.  Of  this  Durban  in  Natal  received 
only  three  per  cent.  The  other  forty  per  cent, 
went  to  Lorenzo  Marques.  The  loss  was  not  only 
in  railway  receipts.  There  were  port  dues,  better 
facilities  of  transport  through  the  coming  of  more 
ships,  quay  dues,  warehouse  dues,  and  large  sums 

79 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


made  by  longshoremen  and  others  who  handled  the 
freight  from  ships  to  railway. 

Cape  Colony  and  Natal  both  thought  that  the 
incorporation  of  the  Transvaal  in  the  British  Empire 
would  certainly  mean  the  return  to  them  of  this 
valuable  traffic.  They  were  terribly  upset  when 
Lord  Milner  decided  to  maintain  the  treaty  with 
Portugal.  Powerful  influences  were  set  in  motion 
in  London  to  have  Lord  Milner's  decision  revoked. 
But  the  British  Government  stood  firm.  They  saw 
clearly  that  if  they  allowed  to  be  taken  away  from 
Lorenzo  Marques  the  carrying  trade  which  was  the 
chief  source  of  revenue  for  the  whole  Portuguese 
colony,  Portugal  would  retaliate  by  forbidding  her 
natives  to  go  to  work  in  the  Transvaal.  Pressure 
could  not  be  brought  to  bear  on  Portugal  on  this 
point,  because  British  colonies  in  Africa  were  doing 
the  very  same  thing  in  regard  to  each  other  in  order 
to  conserve  for  themselves  the  labor  of  ' natives  who 
were  willing  to  work.  Almost  half  the  native  labor 
in  the  Transvaal  mines  came  from  Portuguese  East 
Africa,  To  jeopardize  this  valuable  source  of  native 
labor  was,  in  Lord  Milner's  opinion,  a  danger  much 
greater  than  that  of  offending  Cape  Colony  and 
Natal. 

When  the  Transvaal  received  self-government, 
the  situation  became  worse  for  the  two  old  British 
colonies.  From':i902  to  1907,  they  had  tried  every 
means  of  bringing  the  Transvaal  to  terms.  But 
what  could  be  done  against  a  simple  fact  of  geography? 
Lorenzo  Marques  is  only  about  one-third  as  far  from 
the  Rand  as  Cape  Town.    It  is  more  than  a  hundred 

80 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


miles  nearer  the  Rand  than  Durban.  Even  with 
equal  tariffs,  the  sJiortest  route  was  preferable.  By 
lowering  their  tariffs  to  meet  those  of  Lorenzo 
Marques,  Cape  Town  would  operate  at  a  loss  and 
Durban  with  no  gain.  In  order  to  meet  the  de- 
ficit incurred  in  railway  receipts  by  the  Portuguese 
competition.  Cape  Colony  and  Natal  raised  their 
customs  duties  against  the  Transvaal.  A  tariff 
war  ensued.  At  this  point,  common  sense  pre- 
vailed. The  colonies  got  together,  and  discussed 
their  common  interests.  From  this  discussion  was 
bom  the  federation,  the  story  of  which  is  reserved 
for  a  later  chapter. 

But  even  after  the  conferences  for  discussing  federa- 
tion were  long  under  way,  the  Transvaal  warned  Cape 
Colony  and  Natal  that  too  high  duties,  or  duties 
against  the  Transvaal's  particular  interests,  would 
lead  to  a  refusal  to  enter  the  Union.  To  show  the 
other  colonies  how  independent  she  could  be,  a 
delegate  from  Portuguese  East  Africa  was  invited 
by  the  Transvaal  to  the  conference  of  Pretoria.  The 
Transvaal  was  willing,  if  necessary,  to  trade  entirely 
through  Lorenzo  Marques! 

Just  on  the  eve  of  the  Commonwealth,  the  Trans- 
vaal signed  a  treaty  with  Portugal  regulating  the 
recruitment  of  native  labor,  the  railway  and  port  of 
Lorenzo  Marques  traffic,  commercial  relations,  and 
the  customs  question.  The  treaty  guarantees  to 
Lorenzo  Marques  from  fifty  to  fifty-five  per  cent, 
of  the  maritime  traffic  of  the  Rand  and  other  princi- 
pal centers  of  the  Transvaal.  In  return,  Portuguese 
East  Africa  allows  the  Transvaal  to  recruit  labor, 
6  8i 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  treaty  caused  a  violent  outburst  in  Natal. 
The  municipal  council  of  Durban  cabled  to  London, 
demayiding  that  the  treaty  be  denounced.  But 
London  turned  a  deaf  ear.  Salvation  in  this  case, 
as  always,  was  for  the  Home  Government  not  to 
override  decisions  made  by  a  colony  for  her  own 
interests.  Such  a  course  would  be  justified  only  if 
the  colony  were  acting  in  a  way  prejudicial  to 
imperial  interests. 

When  they  saw  they  could  get  no  help  from  home, 
the  inhabitants  of  Natal,  who  had  not  the  strong 
racial  feeling  that  was  working  for  union  in  Cape 
Colony,  decided  that  the  future  lay  in  agreement 
with  and  not  in  opposition  to  the  rich  and  powerful 
inland  neighbor. 

Union,  as  is  often  the  case  between  nations  as 
well  as  between  individuals,  came  from  seeing  the 
folly  of  conflict  rather  than  from  feeling  the  desire 
for  harmony. 

a  flourishing  colony  with  extensive  semi- 
,  independent  native  areas  inconveniently 
placed:  the  problem  of  natal 

Natal  ceased  to  belong  to  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope 
over  fifty  years  before  the  formation  of  the  South 
African  Commonwealth,  and  after  1856,  was  a  dis- 
tinct British  colony.  It  is  separated  from  Cape 
Colony  on  the  south  of  Griqualand  East,  in  which 
the  native  population  is  very  large.  Between 
Natal  and  the  Orange  Free  State  lies  Basutoland. 
Between  Natal  and  the  Transvaal  are  Zululand  and 

82 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


Swaziland,  which  form  the  angle  of  the  valuable 
little  Delagoa  Bay  corner  of  Portuguese  East 
Africa.  From  Durban,  the  port  on  the  Indian 
Ocean,  a  railway  runs  into  Griqualand  East,  by  way 
of  Pietermaritsburg.  But  it  does  not  join  up  with 
the  Cape  Railway.  Another  line,  running  north- 
west, bifurcates  at  Ladysmith,  one  branch  going 
west  into  the  Orange  Free  State,  and  the  other 
due  north  to  Pretoria.  The  Orange  Free  State  branch 
makes  a  semicircular  curve  around  Basutoland  to 
Bloemfontein,  which  is  almost  directly  west  of 
Pietermaritsburg.  The  Transvaal  branch  skirts 
Zululand  and  enters  the  Transvaal  without  passing 
through  the  Free  State. 

Basutoland  is  a  high  plateau  of  nearly  twelve 
thousand  square  miles,  broken  by  several  mountain 
ranges.  It  contains  the  headwaters  of  the  Orange 
River.  The  protectorate  is  not  an  integral  por- 
tion of  the  South  African  Commonwealth.  Like 
Bechuanaland,  it  is  under  the  direct  control  of  the 
Crown.  But  its  Resident  Commissioner  depends 
upon  the  High  Commissioner  for  South  Africa.  In  all 
this  territory,  larger  than  Belgium  and  as  large  as 
Holland,  there  are  hardly  more  than  a  thousand 
Europeans  among  a  native  population  of  over  four 
hundred  thousand.  European  settlement,  in  fact,  is 
prohibited.  The  native  government  is  exercised 
by  chiefs,  who  owe  allegiance  to  a  paramount  chief. 

Swaziland,  from  1903  to  1906,  was  controlled  by 
the  Transvaal.  But  since  1906,  its  government  is 
like  that  of  Basutoland.  There  are  only  a  thousand 
whites  among  a  population  of  over  one  hundred 

83 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


thousand.  The  British  Crown  has  kept  the  authority 
over  these  native  regions  because  the  whites  of  the 
neighboring  colonies  have  not  shown  that  they  are 
capable  of  governing  justly  homogeneous  native 
populations. ' 

Zululand,  since  1897,  has  unfortunately  formed 
an  integral  part  of  Natal.  Between  the  Tugela  River 
and  the  Swaziland  and  Portuguese  boundary,  the 
population  is  practically  all  native.  Except  along 
the  coast  and  on  the  western  edge,  Zululand  is 
served  by  no  railway. 

The  European  population  of  Natal  has  grown 
three  hundred  per  cent,  in  the  last  forty  years,  while 
the  native  population  has  increased  only  fifty 
per  cent.  But  even  now  among  the  million  and  a 
quarter  inhabitants  of  Natal,  there  are  less  than  one 
hundred  thousand  Europeans  and  about  one  hundred 
and  fifty  thousand   Indians  and  Chinese.  The 

'  In  1907,  taking  heart  at  the  interest  and  sympathy  aroused  in 
England  over  the  Zulu  question,  a  deputation  of  native  chiefs  visited 
London,  although  they  had  previously  been  informed  that  their  mis- 
sion would  be  fruitless,  to  expose  the  griefs  and  discontent  of  the 
Swaziland  natives.  In  1909,  when  Lord  Selbome  visited  Swaziland, 
in  reply  to  the  protest  of  the  native  chiefs  of  their  unwillingness  to 
enter  the  South  African  Union,  the  High  Commissioner  warned 
them  that  amalgamation  was  inevitable.  In  the  same  year,  Lord 
Selbome  opened  the  National  Council  of  Basutoland.  The  as- 
sembled chiefs  told  him  that  they  were  afraid  of  being  incorporated 
forcibly  in  the  Union.  Lord  Selbome  replied  that  Basutoland  would 
sooner  or  later  have  to  come  into  the  Union,  but  that  the  British 
Crown  would  see  to  it  that  native  rights  inland  and  all  other  matters 
would  be  fully  guaranteed.  There  is  no  doubt  about  the  fear, 
resulting  from  Zululand's  unhappy  experience,  among  the  natives 
of  the  protectorates  of  coming  under  the  Government  of  the  South 
African  colonists. 

84 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


native  population  numbers  almost  a  million.  Natal 
has  not  only  the  largest  proportion  of  black  popula- 
tion of  the  provinces  of  the  South  African  Common- 
wealth, but  it  is  cut  off  from  its  neighbors  by 
territories  whoUy  native,  and  in  two  of  which  the  na- 
tives have  managed  to  maintain  semi-independence. 
Natal's  Indian  and  Chinese  problems,  owing  to  the 
long  settlement  of  Asiatic  elements  in  the  colony 
and  their  great  number  (as  we  have  just  said,  they 
outnumber  the  Europeans),  have  been  aU  along 
totally  different  from  those  of  the  neighboring 
colonies. '  Similarly,  Natal's  native  problem  has  for 
the  British  taken  the  place  in  Natal  of  the  Boer 
problem  in  the  other  colonies. 

Zululand  wars  and  "punitive  expeditions"  were 
being  carried  on  for  twenty  years  before  the  in- 
corporation of  1897.  The  troubles  of  Natal  did  not 
end  then.  After  a  long  lull,  a  revolt  broke  out  in 
northern  Zululand  in  the  beginning  of  1906.  The 
natives  refused  to  pay  the  poll  tax.  The  attack  of 
armed  natives  upon  police  in  February  led  to  the 
proclamation  of  martial  law  and  a  punitive  expedi- 
tion. Twelve  natives,  who  had  murdered  a  white 
policeman,  were  sentenced  to  death  by  court  martial. 
Lord  Elgin,  Colonial  Secretary,  interfered  by  cable 
to  urge  a  retrial  by  civil  court  on  account  of  public 
opinion  in  England.  The  Natal  Ministry  at  once 
resigned.  The  colonists  bitterly  denounced  the 
interference  of  the  Home  Government.  The  Colonial 

'  In  1908,  the  Indians  of  Natal  subscribed  the  necessary  funds 
to  carry  on  a  campaign  in  the  Transvaal  and  in  England  on  belialf 
of  the  Transvaal  Indians. 

85 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Office  withdrew  its  opposition,  after  learning  that 
the  Governor  of  Natal  approved  the  sentence,  and  the 
natives  were  executed  on  April  2d.  The  incident, 
however,  led  to  the  first  important  clash  between 
advanced  Radicals  and  Imperialists  in  the  New 
Liberal  Parliament.  Just  as  in  Germany,  the 
Socialists  defended  the  natives,  and  claimed  that  the 
authority  of  the  British  Crown,  by  means  of  British 
troops,  was  being  executed  far  away  from  the  con- 
trolling influence  of  public  opinion  in  England,  to 
oppress  and  take  vengeance  upon  a  weak  African 
race  for  the  benefit  of  colonists.  The  Government, 
between  two  fires,  declared  that  the  matter  of  the 
executions  had  been  gone  into  thoroughly,  that 
the  first  telegram  of  Lord  Elgin  had  not  been  in  the 
nature  of  a  remonstrance  but  rather  a  request  for 
information,  and  that  when  full  information  was 
received,  the  Cabinet  realized  the  justice  and 
necessity  of  the  sentence. 

After  the  execution  the  Zulus  renewed  their  re- 
sistance to  white  authority.  Several  chiefs  led  the 
rebels  with  great  energy.  The  British  troops, 
seconded  by  Natal  militia,  carried  on  a  ruthless  war 
of  extermination  against  the  Zulus,  and  killed  without 
mercy  those  who  were  found  with  arms  in  hand. 
The  Zulus  lost  three  thousand  five  hundred  in  a  little 
over  two  months.  When  one  criticizes  the  campaign 
of  the  Germans  against  the  Hereros,  which  was  just 
drawing  to  a  close  at  this  time,  it  must  not  be  for- 
gotten that  the  British  campaign  in  Natal,  in  pro- 
portion to  the  rebel  effectives  in  the  field,  was  just  as 
merciless  and  just  as  disastrous  to  the  Zulus  as  the 

86 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


German  campaign  to  the  Hereros.  So  disgraceful 
was  the  conduct  of  the  Natal  troops  that  the  Bishop 
of  Zululand  felt  impelled,  much  against  his  will,  to 
pubHsh  the  information  he  had  gathered  of  robbing 
kraals  and  native  women,  stealing  stock,  and  shoot- 
ing natives  and  throwing  their  bodies  out  to  rot. 
By  the  end  of  July  over  three  milUon  dollars  had 
been  spent  in  putting  down  the  uprising. 

A  commission  was  appointed  to  inquire  into  the 
reason  for  the  growing  gulf  between  whites  and 
blacks,  and  to  find  if  the  natives  had  just  ground  for 
discontent  against  the  whites.  The  report  of  the 
commission  in  July,  1907,  was  unanimous  in  declaring 
that  the  natives  hated  the  whites  and  distrusted  the 
Government.  Government  action  seemed  to  have 
done  nothing  at  all  to  raise  the  economic  and  moral 
level  of  the  blacks.  The  rebellion  was  due  to  a 
desire  to  return  to  the  old  mode  of  tribal  and  family 
life.  Was  this  not  natural,  especially  as  the  whites 
had  not,  by  their  new  and  different  method  of 
government,  done  anything  appreciable  to  benefit 
the  blacks? 

I  In  the  autumn  of  1907,  it  was  believed  that 
Dinizulu  and  other  chiefs  were  preparing  a  new 
rebellion.    Dinizulu,  w^hen  the  Natal  Government 

I  threatened  to  send  an  expedition  against  him, 
surrendered  voluntarily.  A  new  Governor  was  sent 
to  Natal.  Early  in  1908  he  pardoned  the  rank  and 
file  of  those  who  had  been  implicated  in  the  rebellion. 
But  Dinizulu  remained  in  jail.  An  English  advocate, 
who  came  out  to  defend  him,  found  that  the  attitude 
of  the  local  authorities  made  impossible  a  fair  trial 

87 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


under  English  law.  It  was  charged  that  the  Natal 
authorities  continued  martial  law  in  Zululand  to 
protect  local  officials,  who  had  been  guilty  of  whip- 
ping and  shooting  natives,  and  to  prevent  Dinizulu 
from  getting  witnesses  for  his  defense.  In  1909, 
after  a  long  trial,  Dinizulu  was  found  guilty  of 
"harboring  rebels,"  and  sentenced  to  four  years' 
imprisonment.  The  Natal  Government  had  been 
unable  to  establish  his  complicity  in  the  rebellion. 

There  was  still  disaffection  of  a  serious  character 
in  Zululand  when  the  South  African  Commonwealth 
was  formed.  Federation  improved  the  chances  of 
the  Zulus  to  receive  fair  treatment,  which  they 
certainly  never  had  had  from  the  Natal  colonists. 
The  geographical  position  of  Natal,  and  the  large 
proportion  of  native  tribes  of  semi-independent 
character  surrounding  the  colony,  made  the  task  of 
government  extremely  difficult.  But  there  can  be 
no  doubt  that  the  white  men  acted  exclusively  for 
their  own  interest,  and  that  when  the  natives  pro- 
tested against  the  collection  of  taxes,  the  benefit  of 
which  was  never  proved  to  them,  they  were  treated  as 
rebels,  tracked  down  like  wild  beasts,  and  killed  in 
their  own  country. 

In  this  brief  review  of  Natal  relations  with  the 
Zulus,  I  have  tried  to  be  perfectly  fair,  and  state 
simply  the  facts.  They  are  very  sad.  When  one 
considers  the  better  fortune  of  the  Basutos,  neighbors 
of  the  Zulus,  and  the  favorable  opinion  held  of  their 
Paramount  Chief,  Letsie,  and  his  recent  successor 
Griffith,  by  the  British  authorities,  the  wisdom  of 
keeping  native  populations,  where  they  are  homo- 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


geneous  and  considerable  in  number,  directly  under 
the  control  of  the  Crown,  is  clearly  demonstrated. 
British  military  and  civil  officials,  who  came  out 
from  England  and  who  bring  to  the  treatment  of 
native  problems  and  the  management  of  the  weaker 
races  splendid  ideals  of  fairness  and  justice,  have 
always  succeeded  in  keeping  peace  and  winning  the 
respect,  if  not  the  affection,  of  native  tribes,  and  the 
confidence  of  their  chiefs.  But  where  natives  are 
put  under  the  control  of  colonists,  and  at  the  mercy 
of  local  militia  officers  and  men,  who  are  swayed  by 
prejudice  and  vengeance,  the  results  are  what  they 
were  in  the  Zulu  expedition  of  1906 — a  disgrace  to 
civilization  and  Christianity.  One  cannot  insist  too 
strongly  upon  the  difference  between  public  school 
and  university  men  from  England  and  men  who  have 
risen  to  the  top  in  the  African  colonies,  often  by 
doubtful  means.  The  latter  are  too  frequently 
"bounders"  of  the  worst  sort,  intolerant  and  in- 
tolerable when  they  have  a  little  authority  in  their 
hands. 

The  story  of  federation  is  reserved  for  a  later 
chapter.  But  this  summary  of  the  years  of  recon- 
struction in  South  Africa  would  be  incomplete 
without  a  word  about  the  two  men  who  represented 
the  British  Government  in  the  delicate  office  of  High 
Commissioner  during  a  period  when  courage  and 
insight  and  tact  were  the  sine  qua  non  of  success  in 
piloting  safely  the  four  colonies  to  the  harbor  of 
federation.  It  was  a  decade  when  recalcitrant 
Boers  and  fanatical  loyalists  were  doing  all  in  their 

89 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


power  to  obstruct  the  course.  Lord  Milner  repre- 
sented the  British  Crown  until  iMarch  1905.  He 
resigned  on  the  eve  of  the  granting  of  responsible 
government  to  the  Transvaal.  Lord  Selbome  was 
High  Commissioner  during  the  four  years  before  the 
establishment  of  the  Commonwealth. 

Lord  Selbome's  resignation,  coming  just  before 
the  Union  was  formed,  was  not  regarded  in  South 
Africa  as  being  due  to  his  wife's  health.  The  Liberal 
Government  was  anxious  to  put  Herbert  Gladstone 
in  some  suitable  post  outside  of  England,  and  Lord 
Selbome  fell  in  with  their  plans.  Lord  Selbome 
was  not  at  all  of  the  same  caliber  as  Milner.  But 
he  was  a  new  broom  and  had  not  been  involved  in 
the  Boer  War  or  in  the  years  of  crisis  and  conflict 
that  followed.  His  popiilarity  with  the  Dutch  was 
largely  due  to  the  great  and  intelligent  interest  he 
took  in  agriculture,  which  led  to  an  appreciable 
promotion  of  the  well-being  of  the  Boers.  He  did 
not  make  the  mistake  of  considering  railway  and 
other  economic  problems  too  largely  from  the 
industrial  point  of  view. 

General  Botha  has  probably  since  regretted  saying 
in  1908  that  "Lord  Milner's  mle  was  the  most 
unfortunate  thing  that  had  ever  happened  to  the 
Transvaal."  Alany  statements,  due  to  the  political 
passion  of  the  moment,  cannot  be  fairly  held  as  the 
real  judgment  of  the  one  who  made  them,  even  at  the 
time  they  were  made.  For  the  sake  of  assuring 
the  rallying  of  all  elements  to  the  Imperial  program 
that  he  kept  constantly  in  mind,  Lord  Milner  may 
have  used  his  official  position  too  strongly  against 

90 


THE  BOER  WAR  AND  RECONSTRUCTION 


the  Afrikander  party,  of  which  General  Botha  was 
the  leader.  But  the  present  soundly  established 
prosperity  of  the  Transvaal  is  largely  due  to  Lord 
Milner's  initiative.  The  German  in  him  betrayed 
itself  sometimes  in  a  political  attitude  that  was  open 
to  objection.  But  it  enabled  him  at  the  same  time 
to  lay  the  foundations  for  the  educational,  agricul- 
tural, and  industrial  development  of  the  Transvaal. 
Lord  Milner  established  a  flourishing  agricultural 
school,  with  research  laboratories  and  model  farms, 
which  is  changing  the  whole  agricultural  system. 
In  the  face  of  great  difficulties  he  inaugurated 
educational  reforms  with  the  hand  of  a  master. 
He  had  the  financial  sense  of  a  Cromer  in  studying 
and  taking  lessons  from  the  budget.  His  resig- 
nation showed  keen  political  insight  and  at  the  same 
time  self-abnegation.  Just  when  the  work  of  years 
was  coming  to  fruition,  he  left  to  others  the  joy 
of  realization.  For  he  saw  that  his  unpopularity 
among  the  Dutch  was  retarding  reconciliation,  Botha 
and  Smuts  and  Merriman  were  ready  to  cooperate 
with  a  British  official.  But,  even  if  they  had  been 
willing  personally  to  work  together  with  Milner, 
they  could  not  have  drawn  their  supporters  with 
them.  So  Lord  Milner  insisted  that  his  resignation 
be  accepted,  not  because  of  ill  health,  or  because  he 
had  lost  his  grip,  but  because  he  knew  that  another 
would  find  it  easier  to  carry  out  the  program  he  had 
inaugurated. 


91 


CHAPTER  IV 


THE  TWO  INDEPENDENT  STATES: 
LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 

PRACTICALLY  every  part  of  Africa  has  been 
brought  under  some  form  of  European 
administrative  control,  with  fixed  bound- 
aries, during  the  last  fifteen  years.  Only  two 
small  states  are  still  independent.  Liberia  in  the 
west  and  Abyssinia  in  the  east  have  succeeded 
in  escaping  "assimilation"  or  "protection."  But 
during  the  past  twenty  years  neither  has  been  with- 
out its  days  of  anxiety.  Liberia  owes  her  independ- 
ence to  the  fact  that  she  is  the  one  protege  of  the 
United  States  in  Africa.  Abyssinia  was  saved  by  the 
courage  of  her  late  Emperor  Menelik,  who  alone  of  all 
African  sovereigns  was  able  to  contest  successfully 
the  armed  invasion  of  a  European  Power.  He  had 
the  luck  to  try  the  fortune  of  arms  with  the  unwariike 
Italians.  Abyssinia  has  since  escaped  through  the 
mutual  jealousy  of  Italy,  Great  Britain,  and  France, 
whose  colonies  surround  her  on  all  sides.  The  two 
independent  states  hold  less  than  three  and  one-half 
per  cent,  of  the  area,  and  about  two  and  one-half  per 
cent,  of  the  population  of  Africa. 

92 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


LIBERIA 

Liberia  was  constituted  as  an  independent  repub- 
lic in  1847  by  freed  American  slaves,  the  first  of  whom 
had  settled  on  the  West  African  coast  during  the 
administration  of  James  Monroe,  twenty-five  years 
before.  The  capital  is  called  Monrovia  in  memory  of 
the  initial  settlement.  Liberia  is  the  only  country 
in  Africa  where  electors  must  be  exclusively  of  African 
blood.  The  United  States  undertook,  by  the  treaty 
of  1862,  to  aid  Liberia,  when  necessary,  to  preserve 
her  constitutional  form  of  government  and  her 
independent  existence.  In  1885,  boundaries  were 
settled  with  Great  Britain  in  regard  to  Sierra  Leone 
Colony  on  the  north,  and  in  1892  with  France  for 
the  frontier  with  the  Ivory  Coast  Colony. 

For  the  first  half-century  of  Liberia's  existence, 
little  that  was  satisfactory  and  definite  could  be 
established  concerning  the  viability  and  success  of 
the  experiment  of  a  negro  state.  It  was  only  when 
Sierra  Leone  and  other  British  West  African  colonies 
began  to  develop,  and  when  France  began  to  organize 
and  consolidate  her  "spheres  of  influence"  into  col- 
onies with  local  administrative  and  economic  organ- 
ization, that  a  comparison  could  be  made,  and  a 
conclusion  reached.  Events  since  1900  seem  to  prove 
conclusively  that  Liberia,  under  negro  control,  has 
little  hope  of  becoming  the  rich  and  prosperous  mod- 
em state  that  could  exist  on  the  West  African  coast. 
For  the  country  possesses,  climatically  and  in  wealth 
of  soil  and  forest,  practically  the  same  conditions  that 
one  finds  in  British  and  French  and  German  West 

93 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Africa.  The  development  since  1900  of  Sierra  Leone, 
the  Gold  Coast,  the  Ivory  Coast,  Senegal,  Guinea, 
Togoland,  Dahomey,  Nigeria,  and  Kamerun  are  set 
forth  in  this  book.    He  who  reads,  sees! 

There  are  about  twelve  thousand  negroes  of  Amer- 
ican descent  in  Liberia,  and  about  fifty  thousand  of 
the  population  of  nearly  two  millions,  including  these 
twelve  thousand,  can  be  said  to  be  civilized,  i.  e., 
amenable  to  constituted  authority.  Liberians  effec- 
tively control  twenty  to  twenty-five  miles  inland 
from  the  coast.  They  have  few  good  roads,  and  no 
railw^ays.  In  1905,  the  Government  was  bankrupt. 
The  only  portion  of  revenue  not  yet  mortgaged  was 
the  sale  of  postage  stamps.  The  trade  with  Great 
Britain  was  largely  in  spirits;  and  the  drink  traf- 
fic was  demoralizing  the  country.  The  spread  of 
drunkenness  among  the  wild  native  tribes  of  the 
hinterland  was  checked  only  by  the  opportune 
appearance  of  the  Mohammedan  propaganda. 

The  lack  of  effective  control  of  the  natives  in  the 
interior  became  a  serious  international  question 
when  France  and  Great  Britain  began  to  penetrate 
and  organize  administratively  adjacent  regions. 
For  recalcitrant  natives  took  refuge  in  Liberian 
territory,  and  year  after  year  raiders  from  Liberia 
seriously  upset  the  normal  conditions  France  and 
Great  Britain  were  working  to  establish  within  their 
spheres.  The  anarchy  of  the  Liberian  hinterland 
became  intolerable  between  1905  and  1910,  and  the 
powerlessness  of  the  Liberian  Government  to  exercise 
effective  control  over  the  interior  tribes  might  have 
led  to  the  partition  of  Liberia,  had  not  the  United 

94 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


States  been  willing,  with  the  consent  and  goodwill 
of  Great  Britain,  France,  and  Germany,  to  send  a 
gunboat  to  Monrovia,  and  to  offer  to  supervise  the 
reorganization  of  the  Government  on  a  solid  financial 
basis.  In  1910,  a  commission  sent  out  by  the  United 
States  recommended  that  the  United  States  take 
over  the  debt  of  Liberia,  recreate  the  administration, 
use  good  offices  for  settling  frontier  disputes  with 
France  and  England,  and  consider  the  question  of 
having  a  coaling  station  on  the  coast.  Both  Liberia 
and  the  United  States  declared  that  there  was  no 
question  of  an  American  protectorate.  But  the 
United  States  undertook  to  reorganize  the  military 
and  frontier  police  forces,  and  an  international  com- 
mission, under  an  American  official,  took  charge  of 
the  revenues  of  Liberia.  The  following  year  a  loan 
of  nearly  two  million  dollars  was  subscribed  by  Amer- 
ican, British,  French,  and  German  banks  to  put 
Liberia  on  her  feet,  and  give  her  a  fresh  start. 

But  the  anarchy  of  the  interior  and  the  raids  across 
the  frontier  had  cost  Liberia  about  two  thousand 
square  miles  of  territory,  which  was  taken  over  by 
France  in  a  new  frontier  agreement  signed  in  191 1. 
A  "rectification"  of  frontier  on  the  north  was  also 
made  with  Great  Britain  during  the  same  year  to  the 
advantage  of  Sierra  Leone.  The  British  colony  had 
already  occupied  the  territory,  which  it  was  claimed 
was  essential  to  Sierra  Leone's  internal  peace: 
Liberia's  compensation  was  a  small  sum  of  money. 

In  1 91 3,  the  British  soap  firm  of  Lever  Brothers 
leased  twelve  thousand  square  miles  (about  one- 
fourth  of  the  territory  of  Liberia)  for  five  dollars  a 

95 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


square  mile.  The  firm  was  to  have  the  monopoly  of 
gathering  and  preparing  the  fruit  of  the  oil  palm,  the 
imcontrolled  use  of  the  land,  and  the  exclusive  priv- 
ilege of  trading  with  natives.  Germany  regarded 
this  agreement,  which  was  a  virtual  transference  of 
sovereignty  to  British  subjects,  as  an  infringement 
of  treaty  stipulations,  and  entered  a  protest  against 
it. 

It  seems  perfectly  clear  that  after  the  present  war, 
an  effective  American  protectorate  will  be  the  only 
means  of  keeping  Liberia  alive — tinless  Monroe's 
doctrine  prevents  the  salvation  of  Monroe's  colony. 

ABYSSINIA 

The  recent  history  of  Abyssinia  is  a  little  more 
encouraging  than  that  of  Liberia,  thanks  to  the  fact 
that  at  the  moment  of  peril  from  European  encroach- 
ment a  fearless,  intelligent,  and  energetic  ruler  was 
at  the  head  of  the  nation. 

The  Abyssinians  are  not  a  seafaring  people,  and  the 
territories  to  the  north  and  east  and  south-east  along 
the  Red  Sea,  the  Gulf  of  Aden  and  the  Indian  Ocean 
nominally  acknowledged  Turco-Egyptian  sovereignty 
before  the  British  invasion  of  Egypt.  They  are 
inhabited  by  Arabic  Moslem  tribes,  in  close  contact 
with  Mecca,  while  the  Abyssinians  are  mostly 
Christians.  After  the  rise  of  the  Mahdi  in  the  Sudan, 
and  the  British  withdrawal  in  1884,  Italy  occupied 
the  Arabic-speaking  territory  on  the  north,  and  a 
large  piece  of  Somaliland  on  the  south-east.  France 
made  effective  the  occupation,  instead  of  proclaimed 

96 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


in  principle  some  twenty  years  earlier,  of  the  western 
shore  of  the  straits  leading  from  the  Gulf  of  Aden  into 
the  Red  Sea,  England  took  over  from  the  wreck  of 
the  Sudan  a  portion  of  the  southern  side  of  the  Gulf 
of  Aden.  The  fortunes  of  these  territories,  though 
intimately  bound  up  with  Abyssinia,  are  treated  in 
another  chapter. 

Italy,  new  to  colonial  problems,  felt  that  the  mo- 
ment was  opportune  to  join  her  portion  of  Somaliland 
with  Eritrea  by  extending  her  power  over  Abyssinia. 
In  1889  a  treaty  was  signed  with  Emperor  Menelik 
in  which  Italian  trickery  introduced  an  all-important 
discrepancy  between  the  Italian  text  and  the  Am- 
haric  text.  The  Italian  text  bound  Abyssinia  to  deal 
with  the  European  Powers  through  Italy :  while  this 
was  optional  in  the  text  that  Emperor  Menelik  could 
read.  When  he  discovered  how  his  good  faith  had 
been  imposed  upon,  Menelik  protested  against  the 
treaty  in  a  powerful  letter  to  Queen  Victoria  in  1893, 
probably  at  the  instigation  of  France  and  Russia. 
But  Abyssinia  was  given  only  "moral  support"  by 
Europe.  War  with  Italy  resulted,  and  ended  in  a 
disastrous  defeat  of  the  Italians  at  Adowa  in  1896. 
Italy  was  compelled  to  sign  a  new  treaty  at 
Adis  Abeba,  recognizing  the  complete  independence 
of  Abyssinia.  This  treaty  afterwards  received  in- 
ternational recognition.  Menelik's  reputation  in 
Europe  was  great.  For  he  acted  admirably  towards 
his  vanquished  enemy,  and  did  not  make  the  mis- 
take of  believing  that  all  Europeans  were  like  the 
Italians,  watching  to  take  advantage  of  him — and 
supported  by  a  weak  army ! 
7  97 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


During  the  trying  period  that  followed  the  recon- 
quest  of  the  Sudan,  he  cooperated  with  the  British 
in  their  effort  to  reestabHsh  order  in  the  territories 
contiguous  to  Abyssinia,  gave  a  British  syndicate  a 
gold-mining  concession,  and  allowed  British  engineers 
to  inspect  the  Sobat  region  and  the  White  Nile 
sources  as  a  possible  route  for  the  Cape-Cairo  Rail- 
way. In  1 901,  he  combined  with  the  British  in 
military  operations  against  the  Mullah  Mohammed 
along  the  Somaliland  frontier.  He  was  always  open 
to  suggestions  as  to  ways  and  means  of  stopping 
gun-running  and  slave-trading. 

In  the  extension  of  European  influence  in  Africa, 
native  rulers  have  come  into  conflict  with  European 
Powers,  and  have  lost  their  independence  for  two 
reasons.  First,  they  have  not  understood  the  im- 
portance of  fixing  boundaries,  and  have  lacked  the 
power  or  will  to  prevent  raiding  from  their  territories 
into  those  under  European  control.  European  ad- 
ministrators, in  order  to  pacify  the  territories  they 
governed,  had  to  look  to  the  sources  of  disorder. 
This  led  punitive  expeditions  on  farther  than  origin- 
ally intended.  Native  sultans  and  kings  and  tribal 
chiefs  who  could  not  keep  order  in  the  European  sense 
of  the  word  were  compelled  to  accept  "protection." 
As  no  native  sultan  or  king  or  chief  could  ever  keep 
order  in  the  European  sense,  Africa  gradually  fell 
under  European  control.  Second,  they  had  been 
the  enemies  of  "progress"  in  the  European  sense  of 
the  word.  Not  wanting  to  develop  their  countries 
themselves,  they  have  refused  to  allow  outsiders  to 
do  so,  and  have  resisted  prospectors  and  concession- 

98 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


hunters  and  traders  until  complaints  of  the  outsiders 
have  ended  by  embroiling  them  with  the  outsiders' 
Government — which  was  generally  just  waiting  for 
the  chance.  The  history  of  Kruger  and  Stein  is 
no  different  from  that  of  a  thousand  petty  native 
rulers. 

MencUk  impressed  his  neighbors  with  his  good 
faith,  and  never  gave  them  a  loophole  to  encroach 
upon  his  kingdom.  He  did  his  best  to  prevent 
trouble  arising  for  them  from  Abyssinian  territory, 
and  he  was  always  willing  to  have  frontiers  exactly 
delimited.  He  welcomed  civilizing  influences,  and 
did  not  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  concession-hunters.  But 
he  made  it  the  cardinal  principle  of  his  dealings  with 
foreigners  to  have  concessions  arranged  by  treaty 
with  governments  and  not  with  individuals.  Thus 
he  put  the  Powers  on  their  honor  not  to  allow 
Abyssinia  to  be  cheated ! 

In  1900,  the  northern  frontier  dispute  with  Italy 
was  settled  by  tacitly  allowing  Italy  to  occupy  a 
portion  of  the  high  plateau,  without  which  Eritrea 
would  have  been  hardly  worth  while  for  Italy  to 
hold.  In  1902,  a  treaty  with  the  British  fixed  the 
boundary  of  the  Sudan,  gave  the  British  the  right  to 
construct  a  railway  through  Abyssinian  territory  to 
connect  Uganda  and  the  Sudan,  and  pledged  Abys- 
sinia to  grant  no  concessions  and  undertake  no  works 
that  would  obstruct  the  flow  of  tributaries  into  the 
Nile.  This  made  feasible  Sir  William  Garstin's  pro- 
ject of  utilizing  Lake  Tsana  for  irrigation,  and  se- 
cured the  fertility  of  the  Blue  Nile  regions. 

Dr.  Rosen  went  to  Adis  Abeba  in  1904  as  special 

99 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


envoy  of  the  Kaiser.  He  was  accompanied  by  an 
escort  of  cavalry,  especially  chosen  for  their  height 
and  clothed  resplendently.  The  showiness  of  the 
mission  led  all  the  world  to  suppose  that  its  signifi- 
cance was  political  rather  than  commercial.  But 
Germany  did  not  then  try,  nor  has  she  since  tried,  to 
secure  more  in  Abyssinia  than  equality  of  treatment 
with  other  nations.  The  German  and  Austrian 
commercial  treaties  were  signed  the  following  year, 
and  have  expired  since  the  beginning  of  the  present 
war.  As  Abyssinia  is  surrounded  on  all  sides  by  the 
enemies  of  Germany,  the  question  is  bound  to  come 
up  at  the  Peace  Conference,  or  very  soon  after, 
whether  the  agreements  entered  into  by  Great  Bri- 
tain, France,  and  Italy  compel  the  Abyssihians  to 
accept  for  transit  and  shipment  at  their  ports  goods 
to  and  from  Abyssinia  irrespective  of  ownership  and 
destination. 

The  desire  to  extend  into  every  sphere  of  colonial 
activity  the  spirit  of  the  Agreement  of  1904  led 
France  and  Great  Britain  to  negotiate  an  Abyssinian 
Convention,  to  which  Italy  adhered.  The  independ- 
ence and  territorial  integrity  of  Abyssinia  were 
guaranteed  by  the  three  Powers,  and  the  sovereign 
rights  of  the  Emperor  were  to  be  respected.  No  con- 
cessions were  to  be  granted  to  one  Power  prejudicial 
to  the  interests  of  the  other  two.  No  matter  what 
internal  complications  might  arise  in  Abyssinia,  in- 
tervention could  come  only  as  the  result  of  a  common 
understanding,  and  limited  to  the  protection  of  the 
legations  and  the  lives  and  property  of  foreigners. 
The  neighboring  territorial  interests  of  the  three  con- 

100 


H.  BUCHER 

B.  P.  80 
LIBREVILLE 
GABON 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


tracting  Powers,  and  the  possible  effect  upon  them 
of  Abyssinian  internal  disorders,  were  set  forth  and 
mutually  recognized.  The  railway  line  from  Dji- 
bouti to  Adis  Abeba  should  be  owned  by  a  French 
company,  but  equal  privileges  over  the  line  and  at  the 
port  should  be  given  to  the  subjects  of  the  other  two 
Powers.  The  railways  that  might  be  built  west  of 
Adis  Abeba  were  to  be  constructed  by  Great  Britain, 
and  that  connecting  the  two  Italian  colonies  from 
north  to  south  by  Italy.  Great  Britain  was  to  be 
allowed  a  railway  through  Abyssinia  from  her  Somali- 
land  to  the  Sudan.  Any  of  the  contracting  Powers 
could  veto  any  agreement  made  by  one  of  the  others 
with  Abyssinia,  should  the  Power  judge  the  agree- 
ment prejudicial  to  her  interests. 

This  agreement,  like  many  others  that  have  been 
made  between  European  states  concerning  African 
and  Asiatic  interests,  has  absolutely  no  international 
or  national  sanction.  Turkey,  Persia,  Morocco, 
Egypt,  China,  Siam  have  had  the  same  experience  as 
Abyssinia.  Their  present  and  their  future  have  been 
tentatively  disposed  of  with  no  consideration  what- 
ever either  for  their  wishes  or  their  interests.  Nor 
have  the  agreements,  as  a  general  rule,  been  sub- 
mitted for  discussion  and  approval  to  the  Parlia- 
ments of  the  nations  which  have  made  them.  What 
is  worst  of  all,  nations  that  are  not  a  party  to  the 
agreements,  and  that  have  not  been  consulted  in 
their  making,  may  find  in  some  future  emergency 
that  a  situation  of  fact,  with  no  legal  or  moral  sanc- 
tion, has  been  established  that  is  wholly  contrary  to 
their  interests.    So  far  as  I  know,  the  Anglo-Franco- 

lOI 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Italian  Agreement  of  1905  has  not  injured  the  inter- 
ests of  any  individual  or  nation  in  Abyssinia,  or  the 
interests  of  Abyssinia  herself.  But  it  might  easily 
have  done  so.  Perhaps  it  secretly  has  done  so.  It 
certainly  will  do  so  after  this  war,  unless  the  prin- 
ciple of  international  sanction  for  agreements  of 
this  character  be  established. 

In  October,  1907,  Menelik  issued  a  decree  con- 
stituting a  cabinet  on  the  European  model,  and 
appointed  ministers  for  the  various  departments. 
The  following  month  he  enjoined  free  compulsory 
education  for  all  boys  up  to  twelve.  The  State  was 
to  provide  schools  and  teachers.  Cabinet  councils 
were  begun,  but  the  education  decree  could  not  be 
very  widely  and  effectively  enforced.  Ever  since 
that  time  there  has  been,  in  spite  of  internal  troubles, 
steady,  even  if  slight,  progress.  ^ 

Just  at  the  time  of  his  ambitious  projects,  Menelik 
had  a  stroke,  and  he  gradually  becanie  paralyzed. 
Frequent  to  the  point  of  becoming  a  joke  were  the 
newspaper  reports,  generally  from  Italy,  during  the 
period  1907  to  1913,  announcing  the  death  of  Mene- 

'  The  will  of  Lady  Meux,  who  bequeathed  her  collection  of 
Ethiopian  MSS.  to  Emperor  Menelik  and  his  successors,  made  a  great 
stir  in  191 1.  Scholars  were  indignant  that  the  precious  parchments 
should  go  to  a  place  where  they  would  be  inaccessible  and  in  danger 
of  destruction  (although  they  had  been  preserved  there  for  over  a 
thousand  years).  But  there  is  something  splendid  in  the  Puritanism 
of  the  noblewoman  who  considered  herself  the  holder  of  stolen  goods 
and  under  obligation  to  make  restitution.  The  MSS.  were  part  of  , 
the  plunder  of  the  British  Expedition  of  1868.  What  would  happen 
to  the  British  Museum  and  the  Louvre  and  other  "collections,"  if 
the  j)ublic  conscience  became  as  sensitive  about  enjoying  the  results 
of  thievery  as  did  Lady  Meux's! 

102 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


lik.  Each  time  they  were  contradicted,  and  when 
he  finally  passed  away  in  December,  1913,  many 
newspapers  refused  to  publish  once  more  the  famihar 
biography. 

Menelik's  long  illness  was  a  great  misfortune  to 
Abyssinia,  and  it  is  still  too  soon  to  estimate  the 
injury  done  by  the  anarchy  of  the  regency  to  the 
Kingdom  surrounded  by  land-himgry  neighbors. 
In  1909,  Lidj  Yeassu,  Menelik's  grandson,  who  was 
thirteen,  and  the  husband  of  the  seven-year-old 
Princess  Romaine,  granddaughter  of  the  old  Emperor 
Johannes,  was  chosen  as  the  successor.  He,  by  his 
own  blood  and  that  of  his  wife,  would  reconcile 
the  rival  factions  of  the  Imperial  family.  Not- 
withstanding the  heralded  harmony,  civil  war  broke 
out,  and  dragged  on,  with  varying  fortunes,  for 
several  years. 

Italy  feared  the  breaking  away  from  authority  of 
the  tribes  on  her  Eritrean  frontier,  especially  after 
the  Tripolitan  War  began,  and  there  was  some  ap- 
prehension of  raiding  in  the  Sudan.  The  anarchy 
caused  no  particular  difference  in  the  Somaliland 
situation,  because  Great  Britam  already  had  her 
hands  full  there,  and  the  responsibility  for  the  Mullah 
could  in  no  way  be  chargeable  to  Abyssinian  unrest. 
The  troubles  in  Abyssinia  seem  to  have  been  con- 
fined to  the  rival  court  factions :  for  the  country  as  a 
whole  remained  quiet  throughout  the  years  of  Mene- 
lik's illness.  However,  there  was  apprehension  in 
Adis  Abeba  just  before  the  outbreak  of  the  European 
War  over  the  sudden  and  inexplicable  strengthening 
of  Italian  forces  in  Eritrea.    Was  Italy  going  to 

103 


THE  NEW  IMAP  OF  AFRICA 


"hold  up"  the  young  King  for  another  slice — the 
third  it  would  be  since  the  battle  of  Adowa — of  the 
northern  plateau? 

WTiat  effect  the  war  is  going  to  have  on  the  fortunes 
of  Abyssinia  is  unknown.  Certainly  there  is  no 
ground  for  attacking  the  territorial  or  political  in- 
tegrity of  the  countr}\  For  Abyssinia  has  not  lent 
herself  to  German  intrigues,  and  given  cause  for  the 
Allies  to  punish  her.  What  propaganda  against  the 
British  and  Italians  can  be  traced  to  Abyssinia,  has 
its  origin  in  purely  Moslem  centers.  The  bulk  of  the 
Abyssinians,  still  Christian  in  spite  of  the  great  wave 
of  Islam  that  has  been  sweeping  over  their  country, 
have  not  believed  in  the  possibility  of  a  Turkish 
reconquest  of  Eg^^pt  and  the  Sudan.  ]\Iy  dear  friend, 
the  late  Col.  C.  H.  M.  Doughty- Wylie,  V.  C,  British 
Consul  at  Adis  Abeba,  wrote  me  at  the  end  of  the 
first  winter  of  the  war  that  conditions  in  Abyssinia 
gave  him  absolutely  no  cause  for  present  or  future 
alarm,  and  that  he  was  "consumed  with  impatience" 
so  far  away  from  the  war.  Two  months  later  he  fell 
in  the  first  landing  at  the  Dardanelles. 

At  the  end  of  September,  191 6,  a  movement  that 
had  long  been  gathering  force  and  poptdar  support 
came  to  a  head.  While  Emperor  Lidj,  who  is  just 
approaching  his  majority,  was  at  Harar — probably 
he  had  fled  in  fear  of  assassination — an  assembly  of 
the  principal  Abyssinian  chiefs  at  Adis  Abeba  voted 
to  dethrone  him,  and  elected  Uizorosso  Uditu,  a 
daughter  of  Menelik,  Empress  of  Abyssinia.  The 
patriarch  of  the  Abyssinian  Church,  Mathias,  sol- 
emnly pronounced  Lidj  an  apostate,  and  unbound 

104 


LIBERIA  AND  ABYSSINIA 


all  his  chiefs  and  subjects  and  his  army  ofBcers  from 
their  oath  of  allegiance.  The  charge  against  Lidj 
seems  to  be  that  he  favors  the  adoption  of  Islam  as 
the  religion  of  state. 

If  they  had  been  inclined  to  listen  to  the  Turco- 
Germans,  the  Abyssinians  could  have  made  much 
trouble  for  the  Allies.  It  remains  to  be  seen  whether 
their  attitude  will  receive  its  proper  reward. 


105 


CHAPTER  V 


BRITISH  POLICY  IN  SOMALILAND 

SOMALILAND  is  the  most  eastern  portion  of  the 
African  continent,  comprising  the  coast  lands 
of  the  Gulf  of  Aden  and  the  Indian  Ocean  in 
the  peninsula  that  ends  in  Cape  Guardafui.  It  is  in- 
habited by  nomad  tribes  of  mixed  Negro  and  Arab 
blood.  The  Arab  strain  is  marked  in  the  tribes  on 
the  north  side  in  the  French  and  British  spheres.  The 
tribes  become  more  African  in  the  Italian  sphere.  The 
inhabitants  of  the  Juba  region  in  the  colony  portion 
of  Italian  Somaliland  (Benadir)  are  black.  But 
throughout  Somaliland  the  religion  is  Moslem,  and 
the  tribal  characteristics  and  customs  are  more  akin 
to  those  of  the  Arabian  peninsula  than  to  Africa. 
This  whole  region  was  nominally  a  portion  of  the 
Ottoman  Empire,  and  fell  to  Egypt  when  the  Khe- 
dives threw  off  the  authority  of  the  Turkish  Sultan. 
The  abandonment  of  the  Sudan  by  Egypt  in  1884 
left  Somaliland  without  legal  political  suzerainty. 

Great  Britain  had  too  recently  become  Egypt's 
protector,  and  was  too  uncertain  of  her  own  position 
and  authority  in  Egypt  to  lay  claim  to  a  vast,  in- 
choate and  imperfectly  known  territory.  She  was 
careful  only  to  have  to  make  sure  that  no  other 

106 


BRITISH  POLICY  IN  SOMALILAND 


European  Power  should  instal  itself  along  the  shore 
of  the  gulf  opposite  Aden.  So  Italy  took  the  Indian 
Ocean  coast  line,  and  France  occupied  the  African 
side  of  the  strait  of  Bab-el-Mandeb.  Invoking  a 
treaty  made  with  the  ruler  of  Obock  in  1862,  she 
extended  her  sovereignty  around  the  bay  to  Zeila, 
the  western  end  of  the  British  sphere.  These  three 
Somaliland  colonies,  with  their  protectorates,  and  the 
ItaHan  colony  of  Eritrea,  north  of  French  Somaliland, 
shut  off  Abyssinia  from  the  coast.  For  twenty  years 
their  hinterland  boundaries  were  unsettled.  But 
after  the  Anglo-French  accord  of  1904,  France,  Great 
Britain,  and  Italy  arrived  at  an  understanding  con- 
cerning their  common  frontiers,  their  boundaries  with 
Abyssinia,  and  their  economic  and  poHtical  relations 
with  the  inland  Christian  monarchy. 

The  French  made  a  port  at  Djibouti  in  1888,  and 
started  to  build  a  railway  south  to  tap  Abyssinia. 
In  the  minds  of  French  Imperialists  Djibouti  began  to 
assume  a  great  importance  in  the  last  decade  of  the 
nineteenth  century:  for  they  dreamed  of  a  railway 
across  Africa  from  west  to  east,  passing  from  Lake 
Tchad,  through  Abeshr  and  El  Fashr,  by  the  Upper 
Nile  Valley  and  the  Sobat  River  to  Adis  Abeba,  and 
ending  at  Djibouti.  This  dream  was  rudely  shattered 
by  the  Fashoda  incident.  Since  then,  French  Somali- 
land has  become  content  to  be  an  outlet  for  Abys- 
sinia trade,  and  to  develop  its  own  resources.  Owing 
to  its  fortunate  position,  its  very  good  harbor,  and 
its  railway,  the  colony  has  prospered.  There  are 
coast  fisheries  and  important  salt  mines.  In  the  year 
before  the  War  of  1914,  over  four  hundred  steamers 

107 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


entered  Djibouti,  and  the  import  and  export  trade 
from  Abyssinia  reached  eight  million  dollars.  So 
long  as  France  remains  friends  with  Great  Britain 
and  Italy,  the  colony  has  no  political  importance. 

Nor  has  Italian  Somaliland  been  of  international 
political  interest  since  Abyssinia  was  made  inviolate 
by  Italy's  1905  agreement  with  France  and  Great 
Britain.  Italian  Somaliland  could  have  played 
a  role  in  African  history,  only  had  Italy  remained 
faithful  to  the  Triple  Alliance.  For  then,  the  Ger- 
mans would  have  had  a  foothold  to  injure  the  British 
in  the  Sudan  and  East  Africa,  and  to  oppose  Franco- 
British  interests  in  Abyssinia. 

British  Somaliland,  however,  has  had  an  interesting 
history  since  1900,  which  has  not  been  without  strong 
influence  upon  the  general  colonial  policy  of  Great 
Britain.  In  narrating  this  history,  we  must  remem- 
ber that  British  policy  in  Somaliland  had  been  guided 
not  by  the  advantages  to  be  gained  from  developing 
the  Protectorate,  but  by  the  geographical  posi- 
tion of  British  Somaliland,  which  has  given  it  an  im- 
portance far  beyond  its  present  or  potential  economic 
value.  It  is  not  far  from  Aden,  and  its  inhabitants  are 
in  constant  communication  with  the  tribes  of  the 
Arabic  peninsula,  both  on  the  Red  Sea  and  Persian 
Gulf  sides  of  the  desert.  Because  of  the  position  of 
Imperial  Britain  as  a  Moslem  Power,  the  British 
have  been  anxious  about  their  authority  in  Somali- 
land, and  have  made  great  efforts  and  sacrifices,  and 
incurred  great  expense,  to  maintain  it. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century,  there 
arose  in  British  Somaliland  a  menace  to  British 

108 


BRITISH  POLICY  IN  SOMALILAND 


authority  in  the  spreading  political  power  of  Mullah 
Mohammed  Abdullah,  the  son  of  an  Ogdan  shepherd, 
who  had  founded  a  Mahdi  sect  near  Berbera  ten 
years  before.  After  Kitchener's  reentry  into  the 
Sudan,  it  was  vital  for  the  pacification  of  the 
southern  provinces  that  no  source  of  Moslem 
fanaticism  find  its  way,  through  the  Islamic  pro- 
paganda in  Abyssinia,  into  the  valleys  of  the  Blue 
and  White  Nile.  So  the  suppression  of  the  Mullah 
was  decided  upon,  and  an  agreement  was  made 
between  Great  Britain  and  Abyssinia  for  a  com- 
mon action,  in  which  the  frontier  should  be  con- 
sidered as  non-existent.  The  Mullah's  forces  were 
broken  up,  but  he  escaped.  In  1902,  he  once  more 
appeared  in  British  SomaHland  with  larger  strength 
than  ever.  A  British  force,  which  followed  him  into 
the  Haud  Desert,  was  badly  defeated.  Troops  had 
to  be  sent  from  Aden  and  India,  and  the  question 
arose  as  to  whether  a  serious  expedition  should  be 
undertaken  to  destroy  the  Mullah,  regardless  of 
expense  or  of  loss  of  life. 

While  the  Foreign  Office  was  debating,  the  Mullah 
sent  a  message  to  General  Manning,  demanding  a 
recognition  of  his  sphere  of  influence  and  removal 
of  restriction  on  the  importation  of  arms.  A  hundred 
National  Scouts  of  the  ostracized  Boers  volunteered 
for  service.  Italy  allowed  the  use  of  her  territory  for 
the  passage  of  British  troops  and  patrolled  her  Somali 
coast  to  prevent  the  importation  of  arms. 

During  the  year  1903,  the  operations  were  incon- 
clusive. The  British  had  three  severe  setbacks,  and 
the  Mullah  raided  at  will.    In  some  mysterious  way 

109 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  Mullah  seemed  to  be  getting  all  the  arms  and 
ammunition  he  wanted;  Abyssinian  cooperation  was 
strikingly  ineffective. 

In  the  face  of  bitter  criticism,  the  Foreign  Office 
decided  on  a  policy  of  "  watchful  waiting  "  throughout 
1904.  The  Indian  troops  were  sent  home,  and  the 
British  and  Italian  Governments  arranged  to  give 
the  Mullah  grazing  rights,  in  return  for  his  pledge 
to  keep  the  peace.  The  Mullah  agreed  to  allow 
freedom  of  trade  in  his  sphere,  except  in  the  case  of 
slaves  and  arms. 

In  1905,  the  British  Government  laid  down  the 
poUcy  that  there  was  no  obligation  to  conquer  the 
Mullah,  so  long  as  he  remained  tolerably  peace- 
keeping. Great  Britain  would  not  allow  tribes  under 
her  protection  to  be  molested,  but  they,  on  their  side, 
should  do  everything  in  their  power  to  defend  them- 
selves. They  could  not,  however,  do  this  unless  they 
were  given  arms  and  ammunition.  But  would  arm- 
ing these  tribes  be  a  violation  of  the  Brussels  Con- 
ference Act,  which  prohibited  allowing  arms  to  go  to 
natives  who  were  not  under  effective  administrative 
control?  The  debates  on  the  subject  showed  clearly 
the  unwilHngness  of  the  Cabinet  to  sanction  the 
expenditure  required  to  organize  administratively 
territories  from  which  there  could  be  no  reasonable 
hope  of  financial  return.  The  revenue  for  1904  had 
decreased  nearly  £5000,  and  the  expenditure  had  in- 
creased £25,000.  The  extension  of  the  French  railway 
from  Djibouti  into  Abyssinia  had. seriously  diminished 
the  trade  through  Zeila. 

For  several  years  the  Home  Government  policy 

no 


BRITISH  POLICY  IN  SOMALILAND 


seemed  to  be  justified  by  the  absence  of  serious  incon- 
venience or  disturbance.  In  1907,  the  country  was 
normal  enough  for  two  English  ladies,  accompanied 
only  by  native  servants,  to  spend  several  months 
at  big  game  shooting  in  the  interior.  But  in  1909, 
the  Mullah  again  became  active,  and  declared  that 
there  could  be  peace  between  him  and  the  British 
only  if  his  authority  in  the  hinterland  were  not 
threatened.  Reinforcements  were  sent  from  India, 
and  a  detachment  of  the  King's  African  Rifles  from 
Mombasa.  A  MiHtary  Governor  was  appointed  for 
Somaliland.  But  Parliament  was  opposed  to  opera- 
tions in  the  interior.  Without  sufficient  forces  to 
insure  safety,  it  seemed  only  inviting  trouble  to  main- 
tain the  advanced  posts.    They  were  withdrawn. 

In  March,  1910,  notwithstanding  raids  on  friendly 
tribes  and  several  small  victories  for  the  Mullah,  the 
Government  decided  to  withdraw  to  the  coast.  In- 
terior posts  were  given  up.  Peace  did  not  follow 
this  withdrawal.  It  was  naturally  interpreted  as 
a  confession  of  weakness.  The  Mullah  had  more 
prestige  than  ever.  There  was  no  more  truth  in  the 
reports  of  his  death  than  in  those  of  the  death  of 
Menelik.  A  ferment  of  anti-European  feeling  drove 
-the  natives  who  had  shown  themselves  notoriously 
Anglophile  to  the  coast  to  seek  protection. 

When  the  report  of  Sir  William  Manning  was 
pubUshed  in  London,  the  Somaliland  controversy 
seized  the  public  mind.  Sir  William  said  that  the 
friendly  tribes  were  being  armed  to  repel  raids:  for, 
although  the  Mullah  was  certainly  not  organizing 
his  forces  to  invade  the  protectorate,  there  would 

III 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


undoubtedly  be  raids  against  unarmed  friendlies. 
Lord  Curzon  complained  in  the  House  of  Lords  that 
the  friendly  tribes,  because  of  loyalty  to  Great 
Britain,  were  now  left  to  the  mercy  of  their  enemies, 
that  the  difficulties  of  Italy's  problem  were  increased, 
and  that  British  prestige  had  been  greatly  injured. 
The  Earl  of  Crewe  and  other  members  of  the  Upper 
House  contended  that  the  only  safe,  honorable,  and 
far-seeing  policy  was  to  send  out  immediately  a  large 
expeditionary  force.  Lord  Lansdowne  gave  a  re- 
sume of  the  reasons  of  Imperial  interest  that  had 
prompted  the  occupation  of  Somaliland  opposite 
Aden.  He  showed  how  Great  Britain  had  necessa- 
rily been  led  from  the  coast  to  the  interior,  and  as- 
serted that  the  appearance  of  the  Mullah  imposed 
obligations  upon  the  British  towards  those  who  had 
submitted  to  the  protectorate.  Members  of  the 
House  of  Commons  also  denounced  the  evacuation  as 
ill-timed  and  premature. 

The  debates  in  Parliament  and  the  press  revealed 
"that  the  underlying  motive  of  British  colonial  policy 
was  to  put  nothing  into  a  country  that  could  not  be 
got  out  of  it  with  interest.  Colonial  policy  has  a 
financial  basis.  Colonies  are  a  national  investment. 
The  British  tax-payer  sanctions  no  expenditure  where 
future  profit  is  not  reasonably  in  sight.  There  were 
only  two  justifiable  reasons  for  a  Somaliland  expedi- 
tion. The  first  was  the  probabihty  of  an  economic 
development  that  would  bring  back  the  money  it 
was  to  cost.  The  second  was  the  defense  of  the 
larger  general  interests  of  the  Empire.  Somaliland 
did  not  seem  likely  to  pay  its  way,  or  to  help  British 

112 


BRITISH  POLICY  IN  SOMALILAND 

trade.  The  Government  was  not  of  the  opinion  that 
the  Mullah  could  make  trouble  in  Africa  for  other 
British  possessions,  or  hurt  British  prestige  in  Arabia 
and  the  Persian  Gulf.  The  friendly  tribes  would  be 
provided  with  arms.  Then  they  could  defend  them- 
selves— just  as  they  would  have  to  do  anyway,  if 
there  were  no  British  protectorate. 

The  financial  argument  of  1905  was  still  potent  in 
1 910,  and  was  reinforced  by  the  report  of  191 1,  which 
showed  that  expenses  had  amounted  to  three  times 
the  revenue,  although  the  administered  area  was  now 
limited  to  the  Berbera,  Zeila,  and  Burhar  districts 
along  the  coast.  In  191 1  the  "political  department " 
was  abolished,  and  some  troops  disbanded. 

After  two  years  of  an  anomalous  regime,  the  crush- 
ing defeat  of  a  British  camel  corps,  which  was  saved 
from  annihilation  only  through  the  attackers'  shortage 
of  ammunition,  showed  how  intolerable,  from  the 
point  of  view  of  prestige,  was  the  protectorate  that 
did  not  protect  merely  because  it  was  a  protectorate 
that  did  not  pay.  In  spite  of  protests  and  a  wide- 
spread agitation,  the  Cabinet  refused  to  give  up  the 
policy  of  "watchful  waiting."  Indian  reinforce- 
ments once  more  arrived  from  Aden.  But  no  pvmi- 
tive  expedition  followed. 

Before  many  months  it  was  realized  that  the  defeat 
at  Dulmadoba  was  having  serious  consequences  in 
vSomaliland,  and  that  loss  of  prestige  was  jeopardizing 
British  interests.  A  state  of  war  and  anarchy  pre- 
vailed. There  was  fear  that  the  Mullah,  who  had 
again  been  raiding  the  friendly  tribes  of  the  interior, 
might  attack  Berbera.  The  House  of  Commons 
8  113 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


was  asked  in  February,  1914,  for  £25,000  "to  meet 
additional  expenses  entailed  upon  Somaliland  in 
connection  with  the  activity  of  the  Mullah.  The 
camel  corps  was  twice  increased.  Mr.  Harcourt 
explained  to  the  House  of  Commons  that  Burao, 
eighty  miles  inland,  and  an  intermediate  post  were 
to  be  re-occupied.  But  the  Government  did  not 
intend  to  attempt  to  pacify  the  interior,  or  to  send  a 
punitive  expedition  against  the  jMullah.  The  Mvdlah 
was  old,  and  in  an  advanced  stage  of  dropsy.  He 
could  no  longer  lead  the  dervishes,  and,  having  been 
excommunicated  by  Mecca,  was  only  a  robber. 
None  regarded  him  longer  as  a  prophet.  The  wise 
policy  was  to  go  as  far  as  Burao,  and  await  the 
Mullah's  death. 

But  Mullahs,  like  Villas,  are  feline  in  their  insolent 
holding  on  to  life.  The  Mullah's  answer  was  to  send 
cavalry  within  firing  distance  of  Berbera.  More  troops 
were  demanded  from  Aden  in  July.  A  few  weeks  later 
there  were  other  fish  to  fry.  London's  attention  was 
centered  on  the  German  advance  towards  Paris. 

The  dervishes  were  still  on  the  offensive  in  Novem- 
ber, 1 9 14.  Cannon  and  naval  aeroplanes  were  used 
to  put  them  to  flight.  It  was  their  first  experience 
with  shell  fire.  But  the  encounter  must  have  taken 
place  pretty  near  the  coast. 

In  spite  of  greater  pre-occupations,  there  was 
constant  anxiety  about  Somaliland  until  the  revolt 
of  the  Sherif  of  Mecca  against  the  Turks  in  the  sum- 
mer of  1 91 6  sounded  the  last  stroke  of  the  death- 
knell  that  had  long  been  tolling  to  the  German  hopes 
of  Mohammedan  help  against  their  enemies. 

114 


CHAPTER  VI 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 
ORTUGAL,  Spain,  England,  and  France  had  an 


excellent  start — a  start  of  centuries — in  Africa. 


Because  her  energies  were  expended  exclu- 
sively upon  the  New  World,  Spain  never  got  very  far.  ^ 
Portugal  still  holds  two  large  colonies  in  Africa  as  the 
inheritance  of  days  of  glory  and  enterprise.  Great 
Britain  entered  Africa  by  conquest  and  exploration. 
From  the  beginning  of  her  colonization  there  was  the 
strong  motive  that  Africa  was  on  the  way  to  India 
and  Australasia.  To  France,  Africa  was  neighboring 
territory,  just  across  the  Mediterranean  from  her 
own  coast.  Russia  had  vast  adjacent  territories  in 
Asia,  and  did  not  need  to  be  interested  in  Africa. 
The  three  States  that  formed  the  Triple  Alliance 
before  the  present  war  achieved  their  unity  after  the 

'  Although  the  colonies  of  Spain  in  Africa  represent  to-day  all  that 
is  left  of  her  vast  colonial  empire,  they  are  not  of  enough  interest  to 
warrant  special  mention.  For  the  Canary  Islands  are  considered  and 
treated  as  a  part  of  Spain,  just  as  the  Madeira  Islands  are  part  of 
Portugal.  There  remain  the  Rio  d'Oro,  which  is  the  Atlantic  end  of 
the  Sahara  desert;  and  two  bits  of  mainland,  very  small,  and  five 
islands,  of  which  Fernando  Po  is  the  only  important  one,  in  the  Gulf 
of  Guinea.  France  has  the  right  of  preemption,  if  Spain  wants  to 
sell  any  of  these  colonics.  The  fortunes  of  Spain  in  the  Rif  are 
treated  in  the  chapter  on  Morocco. 


115 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


best  of  Africa  had  been  preempted:  and  the  choice 
bits  outside  of  European  sovereignty  or  protection 
were  being  gathered  in  by  the  two  Occidental  Powers 
while  the  three  Central  Powers  were  finding  them- 
selves in  the  new  status  resulting  from  the  events  of 
the  decade  1 860-1 870. 

Austria-Hungary,  her  hands  always  full  at  home, 
has  not  aspired  to  colonies.  United  Germany  was 
slow  to  awake  to  the  political  and  economic  advan- 
tages of  a  colonial  Empire.  But  Italy,  long  before 
her  unity  was  established,  was  inspired  by  the  hope 
of  a  partial  reincarnation  of  imperial  Rome  and 
mediaeval  Venice.  One  finds  the  Risorgimento 
literature  permeated  with  the  idea  that  the  new 
Italy  must  become  mistress  of  the  Mediterranean, 
with  sovereignty  over  the  north  coast  of  Africa,  and 
predominant  influence  in  the  territories  freed  by 
the  gradual  dissolution  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.' 

Italians  had  never  given  up  intimate  connection 
with  the  African  and  Ottoman  Mediterranean  coast 
line.  Curiously  enough,  nearest  home,  they  had 
been  largely  supplanted  in  Dalmatia  by  the  Slavs 
and  in  the  Ionian  Islands  by  the  Greeks.  But  they 
still  remained  in  ^gean  and  Levant  ports.  Al- 
though the  nineteenth  century  saw  a  marked  cultural 
conquest  by  France  of  the  Near  East,  Italian  has 
survived  as  a  language  of  communication  with  the 
foreigner  in  all  the  Levant  ports.  Italians  settled 
in  great  numbers  in  Egypt,  Tunis,  and  Algeria. 
Everywhere  they  competed  with  Greeks  for  small 
commerce  and  the  carrying  trade. 

'  See  my  New  Map  oj  Europe,  pp.  123,  125-6,  241. 

116 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


Unfortunately  for  Italian  hopes,  France  and  Great 
Britain  had  no  idea  of  allowing  the  new  State  to 
become  a  menace  to  their  hegemony  in  the  Mediter- 
ranean. Historic  claims  and  economic  considera- 
tions are  worth  nothing,  unless  there  is  the  force  of 
arms  to  make  them  good.  In  the  early  eighties  Eng- 
land installed  herself  in  Egypt,  and  France  took 
Tunis.  Italy's  indignant  protests  fell  on  deaf  ears. 
She  joined  the  Triple  Alliance,  and  with  Germany, 
her  companion  in  ill  luck,  started  to  see  what  scraps 
she  could  pick  up  that  had  fallen  from  the  Anglo- 
French  table. 

The  withdraw^al  of  Egypt  and  Great  Britain  from 
the  Sudan  gave  Italy  what  seemed  to  be  the  only 
possible  opening  for  the  planting  of  her  flag  in  Africa. 
A  stretch  of  the  Red  Sea  coast  between  Suakim 
and  the  Straits  of  Bab-el-Mandeb  was  occupied, 
because  Great  Britain  did  not  care  enough  about  this 
country  to  oppose  the  occupation.  After  the  fall  of 
Khartum  and  the  abandonment  of  the  Upper  Valley 
of  the  Nile,  the  British  had  kept  a  garrison  at  Suakim 
as  a  starting  point  of  future  reconc^uest.  The  French, 
on  the  other  hand,  could  prevent  Italy  from  control- 
ing  the  western  bank  of  the  passage  from  the  Red 
Sea  into  the  Gulf  of  Aden  by  virtue  of  "prior  claims, " 
dating  back  to  1862,  but  which  were  not  taken  ad- 
vantage of  until  1884.  The  territory,  with  an  unde- 
fined interior  occupied  by  nomad  Arab  tribes,  was 
organized  in  1890  as  the  colony  of  Eritrea.  Its 
chief  port,  Massowah,  is  the  natural  port  of  northern 
Abyssinia. 

Farther  to  the  east,  the  Italians  entered  Somali- 

117 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


land,  and  gradually  proclaimed  and  tried  to  extend 
their  sovereignty  over  the  long  stretch  of  coast  land 
from  Cape  Guardafui  to  the  mouth  of  the  Juba 
River,  a  distance  of  one  thousand  miles.  Not  much 
of  the  north  side  of  the  Cape,  on  the  Gulf  of  Aden, 
could  be  occupied,  because  the  British  were  installed 
at  Berbera,  and  refused  to  allow  the  littoral  of  the 
gulf  opposite  Aden  "  to  fall  into  the  hands  of  another 
Power, "  Most  of  this  territory,  which  is  now  called 
"Somaliland  Colony  and  Protectorates,"  is  still 
under  the  actual  control  of  several  Sultans,  who 
nominally  acknowledge  the  King  of  Italy — so  long 
as  he  does  not  bother  them.  The  southern  end,  at 
first  called  Benadir,  is  the  colony.  The  port  of 
Mogadisho  is  the  capital. 

A  glance  at  the  map  will  show  that  these  two 
Italian  possessions  touch  Abyssinia  on  the  north 
and  on  the  south-east,  where  the  colonial  adminis- 
tration is  effective.  It  was  the  Italian  ambition  to 
extend  their  influence  over  Abyssinia.  In  this  way, 
they  would  have  had  two  possessions  of  great  value, 
and  railways  to  the  Red  Sea  and  the  Indian  Ocean 
would  have  carried  to  and  from  the  outside  world  the 
trade  of  a  rich  and  well-populated  country.  But 
they  tried  to  accomplish  this  by  a  shabby  trick,  the 
disastrous  results  of  which  are  narrated  in  the  chapter 
on  Abyssinia. 

The  battle  of  Adowa  in  1896  was  a  crushing  blow 
to  Italian  colonial  aspiration  in  East  Africa.  Abys- 
sinia remained  independent,  established  friendly  re- 
lations with  France  and  Great  Britain,  and  by  the 
wonderful  development  of  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan 

118 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


and  the  creation  of  the  French  port  of  Djibouti,  with 
its  railway  into  Abyssinia,  the  two  Italian  possessions 
have  not  developed  as  was  expected  before  Adowa. 

Two  advantageous  frontier  rectifications  since  the 
Treaty  of  Adis  Abeba  have  given  Eritrea  a  portion 
of  the  high  Abyssinian  plateau,  without  which  the 
colony  would  have  had  no  economic  excuse  for  exist- 
ence. As  it  is,  the  revenue  is  far  below  expenditures 
for  civil  administration.  Italy  has  to  make  good  a 
substantial  deficit,  and  pay  the  charges  of  a  consider- 
able military  force  besides.  Seventy-five  miles  of 
railway  had  been  completed  when  the  Tripolitan 
War  broke  out,  and  this  was  found  to  be  very  helpful 
in  keeping  the  colony  quiet.  Eritrea,  being  opposite 
Arabia,  was  the  nearest  point  of  contact  of  Italy  and 
Turkey.  Her  ports  in  the  Red  Sea  enabled  Italy 
to  prevent  much  communication  and  gtm-running 
between  the  Senussi  of  the  Tripolitan  hinterland  and 
Arabia.  The  transit  trade  of  Massowah  has  become 
more  important  of  recent  years,  though  not  at  all 
what  it  ought  to  be,  if  we  compare  the  volume  of 
trade  with  that  of  other  African  ports  whose  hinter- 
land is  much  less  advantageous.  Were  it  not  for 
pearl-fishing,  palm  nuts,  and  a  little  gold-mining  near 
Asmara,  Eritrea  would  cost  Italy  more  than  the 
voters  of  the  colonial  budget  are  probably  willing  to 
pay.  During  the  first  year  of  the  present  war,  the 
Massowah  hide  exports  (some  coming  from  the 
British  Sudan !)  were  a  very  precious  help  to  Germany, 
who  got  them  safely  through  the  Mediterranean 
under  the  Italian  flag. 

Owing  to  the  intractability  of  the  native  Sultans 

119 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


and  the  successes  of  the  Mullah  Mohammed  in 
defying  the  British  in  the  neighboring  colony,  the 
Somaliland  Protectorate  has  never  meant  much  more 
than  trouble  and  a  valuable  ground  for  wireless 
telegraphy  experiments.  But  the  Benadir  Colony  in 
the  south  has  been  organized  and  developed  on  sound 
lines  since  1 908,  and  Italy  is  beginning  to  sell  on  a 
large  scale  her  cotton  goods  and  other  manufactured 
products  to  the  natives,  and  get  commission  and 
transport  profit  out  of  a  growing  export  cattle  trade. 

After  the  bitter  disappointment  on  the  confines  of 
Abyssinia,  Italy  began  to  concentrate  her  energies 
upon  Tripoli,  the  last  Ottoman  possession  in  Africa. 
A  policy  of  "pacific  penetration"  was  begun,  and 
might  eventually  have  been  successful,  had  it  not 
been  for  the  Young  Turk  Revolution  of  1908,  the 
starting  point  of  a  new  era  in  the  history  of  the 
eastern  Mediterranean. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century  Abdul 
Hamid,  engrossed  in  his  pan-Islamic  policy,  looked 
upon  Tripoli  as  the  foyer  of  the  renaissance  of  Turk- 
ish influence  in  Africa.  The  religious  propaganda  of 
Islam  had  been  making  rapid  strides  in  Africa,  and 
the  Sultan  planned  to  use  his  position  as  Khalif  to 
counteract  the  political  arrangements  of  the  Euro- 
pean Powers  for  the  final  partition  of  Africa.  He 
did  not  hope  for  much  aid  from  Egypt.  But  in  the 
hinterland  of  Tripoli,  the  Senussi  sect  could  be  used 
to  resist,  under  his  segis,  the  spread  of  infidel  rule 
in  the  Sudan  and  the  Sahara. 

France  and  Great  Britain,  after  the  Fashoda  in- 
cident, had  divided  the  interior  of  North  Africa  into 

120 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


spheres  of  influence,  and  France  had  arrived  at  an 
understanding  with  Italy,  by  which  Italian  ambitions 
in  Tripoli  and  French  ambitions  in  Morocco  were 
reciprocally  sanctioned.  Acting  upon  his  perfect 
right,  for  he  had  not  been  consulted,  the  Sultan  of 
Turkey  objected  to  the  Anglo-French  Sudanic  agree- 
ment, and  refused  to  recognize  it.  When  he  lost 
what  he  believed  would  be  a  valuable  and  active 
local  support  by  the  death  of  the  Grand  Senussi  in 
1902,  he  showed  the  only  possible  means  of  effective 
protest  by  putting  a  strong  Turkish  garrison  at  Bilma 
for  the  protection  of  the  Tripolitan  hinterland,  and 
let  it  be  understood  that  the  Turks  would  proceed 
immediately  to  extensive  military  operations  for 
bringing  under  effective  control  Turkish  territory 
up  to  Lake  Chad. 

As  long  as  France  and  Great  Britain  were  mutually 
distrustful  and  suspicious  of  each  other  in  North 
Africa,  and  as  long  as  Abdul  Hamid  could  make 
trouble  for  the  French  by  his  strong  influence  over 
the  Bey  of  Tunis,  there  seemed  to  be  some  hope  of 
Turkish  ambitions  being  realized.  But  France  and 
Great  Britain  compounded  all  their  colonial  rivalries 
by  the  Agreement  of  1904.  The  old  Bey  of  Tunis 
died  in  1906,  and  was  succeeded  by  a  ruler  who  had 
been  brought  up  under  European  influence,  and  was 
wholly  loyal  to  the  French.  The  Sultan's  only  hope 
from  that  moment  lay  in  superior  military  force. 
This  he  did  not  have.  So  the  Sudan,  and  later  the 
whole  of  Tripoli,  was  lost  to  the  Ottoman  Empire. 

It  was  not  a  bad  thing  for  French  ambitions  that 
the  Turks  tried  to  get  into  the  hinterland  of  Trijioli. 

121 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


For  it  enabled  France,  without  violating  her  Italian 
agreement,  to  anticipate  Italy,  and  to  define  what 
had  always  been  a  vague  boundary.  In  June,  1906, 
the  Turks  sent  a  secret  expeditionary  force  to  occupy 
the  desert  oases,  of  which  Djanet  was  the  chief. 
France  protested  to  the  Porte,  declaring  that  Djanet 
was  outside  of  Tripoli,  which  the  French  claimed 
extended  no  farther  than  Ghat.  The  Sultan  had  to 
issue  an  irade,  recognizing  that  Djanet  was  in  the 
French  sphere,  and  countermanding  the  instructions 
given  to  the  Turkish  army  in  Tripoli  to  penetrate 
the  Sudan. 

But  after  the  Young  Turk  Revolution,  many  trades 
of  Abdul  Hamid  were  repudiated.  When  the  French 
Ambassador  at  Constantinople  tried  to  get  a  clear 
understanding  about  the  hinterland  of  Tripoli,  he 
met  with  a  rebuff.  So  he  warned  his  Government 
against  the  dangers  to  which  the  French  in  North 
Africa  might  be  exposed.  The  fear  was  soon  realized. 
In  the  autumn  of  1909,  the  Turks  began  to  show  un- 
wonted activity  in  the  Sudan.  It  appeared  that  the 
Senussi  sect  was  taking  great  comfort  in  Turkish 
promises.  The  Young  Turks  had  an  easy  task  in 
arraying  the  Arab  tribesmen  against  France.  For 
the  only  remaining  outlet  to  the  slave  trade  was  by 
way  of  Borku  to  Tripoli. 

I  was  away  from  Turkey  during  that  winter,  and 
was  living  in  Paris.  It  was  common  knowledge  there 
that  the  French  were  meeting  with  serious  opposition 
in  the  hinterland  of  Tripoli,  and  that  their  losses  were 
heavy.  But  little  was  allowed  to  be  published,  for 
France  wanted  to  keep  on  friendly  terms  withTurkey, 

122 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


and  preferred  to  think  that  the  Sudan  opposition 
was  due  to  local  causes.  Ottoman  troops,  however, 
occupied  the  oasis  of  Kafura,  a  Senussi  center,  and 
there  were  reports  from  Constantinople  of  the  Turk- 
ish intention  to  cooperate  with  the  Senussi  to  estab- 
lish control  over  the  caravan  route  across  the  eastern 
Sahara  from  Lake  Chad.  There  was  an  enormous 
traffic  of  arms,  the  effects  of  which  are  still  felt,  from 
Tripoli  to  the  desert  tribesmen.  Italian  intervention 
could  not  have  been  looked  upon  by  France  with  an 
unfriendly  eye:  for  it  drew  bellicose  tribesmen  into 
the  Turkish  service  in  Tripoli,  and  left  France  a  free 
hand.  Shortly  after  entering  upon  her  war  of  aggres- 
sion, Italy  annexed  the  African  province  of  Turkey. 
But  her  politicians  had  no  more  idea  than  her  soldiers 
of  the  interior  of  the  country,  what  its  boundaries 
ought  to  be,  or  what  they  were  going  to  be.  When 
Turkey  finally  agreed  to  oppose  no  longer  the  Italian 
occupation  of  Tripoli  and  Cyrenaica,  the  British  in 
Egypt  had  occupied  Solium,  and  France  was  firmly 
established  in  the  oases  of  the  Tripolitan  hinterland. 
There  was  no  intention  of  allowing  Italy,  any  more 
than  Turkey,  to  enter  the  Sudan! 

In  the  second  Ottoman  Parhament,  I  heard  Nadji 
Bey,  deputy  for  Tripoli,  pleading  with  the  Young 
Turks  to  follow  the  only  policy  that  would  save  his 
country.    He  said: 

"Do  not  have  any  doubt  about  the  fact  that 
Tripoli  is  to-day  economically  in  the  hands  of  the 
Italians,  and  that  we  are  traversing  a  period  of 
serious  transition.  Let  me  confine  my  illustration 
to  public  instruction.    The  Italians  have  a  dozen 

123 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


fine  schools,  and  our  Ministry  has  not  known  how  to 
establish  a  single  one  since  the  constitution.  There 
are  four  old  schools,  but  they  still  lack  professors, 
because  there  is  no  money  to  pay  them.  The  Italian 
schools  provide  for  the  needs  of  thirty-two  thousand 
inhabitants,  whose  children  receive  an  education 
which  has  nothing  in  it  of  Ottoman.  More  than 
twenty  thousand  Jews  are  to-day  won  over  to  Italy. 
We  have  a  population  of  a  million  and  a  half  Mos- 
lems, deprived  of  educational  facilities.  Instead  of 
establishing  schools,  you  are  occupied  with  forming 
school  districts  on  paper.  Comrades,  the  Turkish 
language  is  lost  for  our  subjects  in  Tripoli.  If  you 
were  to  compare  our  schools  with  those  of  the 
Italians,  you  would  weep.    To-day  " 

Here  Nadji  Bey  was  interrupted  by  a  loud  clam- 
our, and  his  speech  remained  unfinished.  It  had 
no  effect.  Nothing  was  done.  As  we  have  seen, 
the  Young  Turks  were  devoting  their  energies  and 
money  to  stirring  up  trouble  in  the  Sudan,  thus 
playing  into  Italy's  hands.  For  France  and  Great 
Britain  would  now  welcome  the  realization  of  Italy's 
ambition. 

On  September  27,  1911,  Italy  presented  to  the 
Sublime  Porte  an  ultimatum,  demanding  consent  in 
forty-eight  hours  to  an  Italian  Protectorate  over 
Tripoli.  Turkey  naturally  ignored  the  ultimatum. 
Italy  declared  war,  and  sent  an  expedition  to  occupy 
Tripoli.  The  war  lasted  for  a  year,  and  was  confined 
(since  Italy  feared  getting  the  ill-will  of  the  other 
Powers)  to  Tripoli,  with  the  exception  of  a  futile 
demonstration  at  the  Dardanelles  and  the  occupation 
of  Rhodes  and  other  islands  of  the  Dodecanese.  The 

124 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


formation  of  the  Balkan  League,  in  September,  191 2, 
and  the  inevitable  approach  of  a  new  war,  induced 
Turkey  to  consent  to  the  loss  of  her  last  African 
province.  By  the  treaty  of  Ouchy,  October  15, 
1 91 2,  Turkey  was  not  asked  to  recognize  the  Italian 
conquest,  but  merely  to  grant  complete  autonomy 
to  Tripoli.  The  Turkish  army  was  to  be  withdrawn 
from  Tripoli  and  Bengazi,  after  which  Italy  was 
to  withdraw  her  army  from  the  ^gean  Islands. 
Commercial  and  diplomatic  relations  were  to  be 
resumed,  and  Italy  was  to  take  over  Tripoli's  share 
of  the  Ottoman  Public  Debt. ' 

The  impotence  of  Turkey  to  resist  Italy's  occupa- 
tion of  Tripoli  was  due  solely  to  the  fact  that  Italy 
had  control  of  the  sea.  It  was  impossible  to  send 
reinforcements  and  supplies  of  ammunition  and  arms. 
But,  in  spite  of  this  handicap,  Italy  did  not  have 
brilliant  success  during  the  year  of  continual  fight- 
ing. She  was  not  fighting  Turkey,  but  the  natives  of 
Tripoli,  backed  by  powerful  support  from  the  Senussi 
and  Arab  tribes  of  the  hinterland.  Italy  signed  the 
Treaty  of  Ouchy  in  order  to  induce  Turkey  to  use 
her  influence  to  reconcile  the  Arabs  to  the  Italian 
occupation.  To  accomplish  this,  Italy  maintained 
her  occupation  of  the  islands  of  the  Dodecanese,  on 
the  ground  that  Turkish  officers  were  still  in  Tripoli, 
organizing  and  keeping  alive  what  Italy  now  called 
the  "rebellion"  of  the  natives. 

'  The  story  of  the  "pacific  penetration, "  the  attempt  of  the  Young 
Turks  to  check  it,  the  Italo-Turkish  War,  and  the  ncf^otiations 
which  ended  in  the  Treaty  of  Ouchy  (Lausanne)  is  told  in  detail  in 
The  New  Map  of  Europe,  pp.  241-262. 

125 


THE  NEW  AIAP  OF  AFRICA 


This  was  perfectly  true.  I  know  many  Young 
Turks  who  went  to  Tripoli,  and  never  came  home. 
They  are  even  now  by  no  means  all  dead.  Their 
attitude  was  well  expressed  by  one  of  them  who  went 
out  to  Africa  after  the  Balkan  War  was  ended,  in 
May,  1 91 3.  Like  many  of  his  friends,  he  was  going 
to  Eg>-pt,  and  if  he  could  not  succeed  in  getting 
through  there,  knew  how  it  could  be  done  by  way  of 
Tunis.  He  said  to  me,  when  I  went  down  to  Galata 
to  see  him  off:  "I  know  that  Turkey  is  dying,  and 
that  Islam  is  dying.  How  can  I  do  better  than  die 
with  my  cotmtry  and  with  my  religion?  And  where 
can  I  make  the  sacrifice  more  worth  while  than  in 
TripoU  against  the  Italians?" 

The  Turks  have  affection  for  the  French,  and  re- 
spect for  the  English.  They  have  great  faith  in  the 
ability  of  the  Germans,  and  more  or  less  sympathy 
with  the  German  way  of  going  about-  things,  and 
getting  things  done.  They  have  too  much  in  com- 
mon with  the  Russians,  in  blood  and  nature,  not  to 
be  rivals.  But  the  Italians  they  regard  in  the  same 
light  as  the  Greeks,  imtrustworthy  morally  and  weak 
physically.  They  may  accept  as  a  social  and  military 
equal  the  Englishman,  the  German,  the  Frenchman, 
the  Austrian,  the  Hungarian,  the  Pole,  and  the  Rus- 
sian— but  never  the  Italian.  It  is  necessary  to  make 
this  statement,  and  to  add  that  the  Arabs  adopt 
practically  the  same  view,  in  order  to  explain  how 
difficult  is  Italy's  task  in  Africa.  If  a  man  re- 
spects you,  you  can  conquer  or  ignore  his  hate. 
Italy  wall  never  make  a  success  of  African  coloniza- 
tion unless  she  effaces  the  impression  of  Adowa, 

126 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


which  her  four  years  in  Tripoli  have  tended  only  to 
confirm. 

While  progress  in  Cyrenaica  was  too  slow  in  191 3 
to  admit  of  organization  of  the  new  colony,  for  the 
tribes  were  uncompromisingly  hostile  and  uncon- 
quered  and  the  Italians  had  to  stick  to  the  coast, 
much  was  done  in  Tripoli  to  make  a  good  impression 
at  home  and  on  the  outside  world.  The  city  itself 
was  transformed  in  a  few  months,  and  it  was  esti- 
mated that  eleven  thousand  Italians,  outside  of  the 
military  forces,  were  already  in  the  new  colony.  The 
country  was  being  explored  for  mines  and  other 
possible  ways  of  exploitation,  and  railways  along 
the  coast  to  the  Tunisian  frontier  and  inland  to 
Ghadames  were  being  surveyed. 

Shortly  before  the  European  War  broke  out,  Italy 
reported  that  quiescent  conditions  were  prevailing 
on  the  other  side  of  the  Mediterranean,  and  the  re- 
vised Treasury  statements  showed  that  the  acquisi- 
tion had  cost  up  to  1914  over  two  hundred  and 
twenty-five  million  dollars.  The  army  losses  have 
never  been  completely  compiled.  If  Tripoli  had 
really  been  acquired,  and  if  Italy  were  quit  of  the 
problem  of  conquest  with  even  a  huge  sum  of  money 
and  heavy  loss  of  life,  perhaps  some  would  think  the 
game  worth  the  candle. 

The  articles  that  have  appeared  in  European  and 
American  reviews  and  newspapers  about  the  value 
of  Tripoli  have  aroused  a  great  deal  of  interest,  and 
resulted  in  much  speculation.  Directly  opposite 
views  have  been  set  forth,  and  argued  with  plausi- 
bility.   Tripoli  supported  a  large  population  and  was 

127 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


a  source  of  much  wealth  to  ancient  Rome.  Why  not 
to-day?  Is  it  in  Tripoli,  as  throughout  the  territories 
of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  the  blight  of  Islam?  Or  was 
wealth  and  fertility  magnified  and  exaggerated  in 
classical  history?  Did  what  seems  to  us  of  no 
account  appear  to  the  Romans  and  Greeks  a  great 
deal?  But  we  have  refutation  of  this  in  our  actual 
knowledge  of  their  wealth:  and,  if  architecture  is  a 
criterion,  would  a  little  seem  much  to  those  who  built 
Baalbek  and  Palmyra?  Or  is  Tripoli  a  hopeless 
proposition  because  of  the  truth  of  the  theory  of 
climatic  changes? 

Out  of  the  confusion  of  opinion  one  does  gain, 
however,  a  pretty  good  idea  that  Tripoli  is  to-day 
the  least  promising  portion,  potentially  as  well  as 
actually,  of  the  north  African  coast.  Again  we  see 
strikingly  illustrated  the  handicap  that  confronts  in 
the  twentieth  century  the  Powers  who  achieved  unity 
and  ability  for  extra-European  expansion  after  the 
best  of  Asia,  Africa,  and  the  islands  had  already  been 
occupied. 

Considering  the  colonial  activity  in  these  later 
Powers,  we  must  add  to  the  handicap  of  having  to 
take  the  leavings  the  fact  that  we  are  too  prone  to 
judge  the  ability  and  qualifications  of  these  new- 
comers by  comparison  with  what  the  "old  hands" 
are  able  to  do  after  generations  of  experience.  In 
writing  this  very  chapter  the  thought  has  occurred 
to  me  that  I  have  been  judging  Italy  by  what  France 
or  Great  Britain  could  have  done  under  similar  cir- 
cumstances. But  let  it  be  remembered  that  when 
France  first  entered  upon  her  African  Mediterranean 

128 


THE  COLONIAL  VENTURES  OF  ITALY 


conquest  in  Algeria,  it  took  her  fifteen  years  to  get 
from  Algiers  to  Constantine,  and  certainly  half  a 
century  to  accomplish  what  we  have  expected  of 
Italy  in  four  years. 

The  repercussion  of  the  war  in  Europe,  which 
had  no  serious  effect  in  Egypt  or  Tunis,  hit  the  Ital- 
ians hard,  and  proved  that  they  had  not  conquered 
Tripoli  at  all.  Native  troubles  were  supposed  to 
be  the  resxilt  of  German  intrigue,  and  the  German 
Consul  in  Tripoli  was  arrested,  together  with  other 
Germans  who  were  under  suspicion  of  being  army 
officers  conspiring  with  the  natives.  But  even  if  this 
be  true,  it  can  be  pointed  out  that  German  intrigues 
fell  flat  every^'here  else  in  Africa.  The  unwelcome 
truth  was  forced  upon  Italy  in  a  striking  way 
when  in  the  spring  of  191 5  the  news  reached  Rome  of 
the  disastrous  defeat  of  Colonel  Miani,  who  lost 
nearly  half  his  European  troops  and  some  gims  by  a 
sudden  mutiny  of  native  troops  near  Sidera.  After 
killing  a  thousand  Italians,  four  thousand  native 
troops,  with  all  their  equipment,  joined  the  rebels. 

By  the  end  of  191 5  the  Italians  were  back  again  on 
the  coast,  w^here  they  had  started  in  October,  191 2. 
AVhat  the  end  of  191 6  will  bring  no  man  knows.  But 
Italy  has  yet  before  her  the  task  of  conquering  and 
colonizing  Tripoli. 


0 


129 


CHAPTER  VII 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS:  THE  NUCLEUS  OF 
THE  FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 

'TT^HE  establishment  of  the  French  Protectorate 


over  Morocco  in  19 12  was  the  cuknination  of 


eighty  years  of  effort  in  North  Africa.  The 
French  African  empire,  with  the  exception  of  Somali- 
land  and  Madagascar,  is  made  up  of  contiguous 
territories,  extending  over  a  quarter  of  the  continent, 
with  numerous  ports  on  the  Mediterranean  and  the 
Atlantic.  In  this  empire  is  included  the  Sahara 
Desert,  a  large  part  of  the  Sudan,  the  entire  valley  of 
the  Senegal,  two  thirds  of  the  Niger,  and  a  portion  of 
the  Congo  valley.  All  the  colonizing  European 
states,  Italy,  Great  Britain,  Germany,  Belgium,  Por- 
tugal, and  Spain  are  somewhere  France's  neighbors. 
By  her  little  colony  in  Somaliland,  French  territory 
touches  Abyssinia  in  the  east.  Liberia  is  a  neighbor 
in  the  west.  In  Madagascar  France  holds  the  one 
large  African  island. 

The  French  African  empire  started  on  the  Mediter- 
ranean under  Louis  Philippe,  was  spread  to  West 
Africa  under  Napoleon  III.,  and  across  the  Sahara 
and  through  the  Sudan  to  Central  Africa  under  the 
Third  Republic.    Algeria  was  the  nucleus  on  the 


130 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


Mediterranean,  and  Senegal  on  the  Atlantic,  It  has 
been  a  curious  combination  of  foresight  and  luck,  the 
building  of  this  empire,  and,  as  in  the  case  of  every 
other  African  colony  and  every  other  Power,  more 
the  latter  than  the  former.  Luck  deserted  the 
French  only  twice  in  all  the  nineteenth  century — 
when  they  let  the  British  get  a  foothold  in  the  delta 
of  the  Niger,  and  when  they  failed  to  push  their 
expedition  into  the  headwaters  of  the  Nile  before 
Kitchener  started  to  reconquer  the  Sudan. 

In  studying  the  history  of  French  colonial  expan- 
sion, to  which  four  chapters  of  this  book  are  devoted, 
one  is  struck  with  several  outstanding  facts:  the 
fewness  of  the  men  who  dreamed  dreams  and  thought 
the  dreams  could  be  realized ;  the  peculiar  suitability 
of  Arab  and  desert  warfare  to  the  military  genius  of 
the  French ;  the  beginning  of  the  solution  of  adminis- 
trative problems  and  the  realization  of  economic 
return  only  in  the  twentieth  century.  As  with  the 
British,  generations  passed  of  hit  and  miss,  of  blunder 
and  improvisation,  before  government  and  people 
were  converted  to  the  wisdom  and  necessity  of  a 
colonial  policy  through  placing  before  their  eyes  the 
goal  of  financial  benefit.  British  imperialism,  as  a 
national  and  popular  program,  began  with  the  recon- 
quest  of  the  Sudan  and  the  Boer  War.  French 
imperialism,  as  a  national  and  popular  program, 
began  with  the  humiliation  of  Fashoda.  The  new 
map  of  Africa  was  made  during  the  fifteen  years 
preceding  the  present  war. 

The  late  Europeanization  of  the  Mediterranean  is 
the  great  enigma  of  modem  history.    While  remote 

131 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


regions  of  the  globe  were  being  transformed  and 
brought  under  the  cegis  of  European  civilization, 
the  Mediterranean  remained  under  the  shadow  of 
Islam,  a  closed  sea,  whose  waters  washed  nations  in 
the  embryo  and  vast  coasts  where  anarchy  had  reigned 
for  fifteen  centuries  since  the  disappearance  of  the 
Roman  Empire.  France  went  into  Algeria  in  1830, 
and  inaugurated  the  modem  era  of  the  Middle  Sea, 
not  because  of  a  conviction  that  the  time  had  come  to 
do  away  with  the  pirates  of  the  Barbary  Coast,  but 
because  of  a  trivial  dispute  between  the  Dey  of  Al- 
giers and  the  French  Consul  over  a  question  of  grain ! 
It  was  an  auspicious  moment,  however.  The  sea 
power  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  had  been  irrevocably 
destroyed  three  years  before  at  the  battle  of  Nava- 
rino.  Mohammed  Ali  was  severing  in  Egypt  the 
essential  link  of  the  chain  that  bound  Africa  to 
Turkey.  Christian  civilization  was  being  reestab- 
lished in  the  Hellenic  peninsula.  Italy  was  at  the 
threshold  of  the  generation  which  was  to  bring  na- 
tional unity. 

It  took  almost  the  entire  reign  of  Louis  Philippe 
to  conquer  Algeria.  The  Second  Empire,  although  it 
made  a  beginning  of  West  African  conquest  in  Sene- 
gal, had  no  other  policy  for  Africa  than  the  intangible 
dream  of  reestablishing  an  Arab  empire.  Napoleon's 
energies  were  occupied  in  Turkey,  Italy,  Syria,  and 
Mexico.  France  turned  to  Africa  after  the  disas- 
trous war  with  Prussia  in  order  to  find  consolation 
for  the  loss  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine.  But  there  was 
no  certain  goal.  Energies  and  money  and  men  were 
dissipated  in  Indo-China  and  Madagascar.  Siam 

132 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


received  more  attention  than  Algeria.  Sentimental- 
ists clung  persistently  to  the  hope  of  "getting  back" 
Egypt.  Even  the  imperialists  who  had  faith  and 
conviction  in  the  colonial  future  of  France  groped 
blindly  in  the  dark. 

Fashoda  was  the  awakening.  This  humiliation 
had  to  come.  For  the  first  time  since  1870,  France 
asked  herself,  "Quo  vadis?"  It  aroused  in  the 
French  nation  a  determination  to  hold  and  develop 
properly  the  heritage  of  whose  possession  the  France 
of  slippers  and  dressing-gown  was  scarcely  aware. 
It  pointed  out  clearly  to  the  statesmen  and  empire- 
builders  of  France  the  one  coiu-se  that  would  give 
practical  results.  There  must  be  complete  tmder- 
standing  and  cooperation  with  Great  Britain.  Hence 
the  agreement  of  1 899  concerning  spheres  of  influence 
in  the  Sudan,  and,  five  years  later,  the  solid,  perma- 
nent foundation  for  empire-building  in  the  agreement 
of  May  8,  1904.  In  the  meantime  an  agreement  was 
signed  with  Italy  providing  for  the  future  of  Tripoli. 

These  international  arrangements  assiu"ed  France 
a  free  hand  and  support  in  Morocco,  sanction  of  her 
occupation  of  Tunis,  the  territorial  changes  and 
economic  stipulations  necessary  for  the  proper  organ- 
ization and  development  of  her  West  African  and 
Equatorial  African  possessions.  In  return,  Egypt 
was  left  to  the  British  and  Tripoli  to  the  Italians. 
With  aims  definitely  centered  on  definitely  assured 
territories,  the  builders  of  the  colonial  empire  were 
able  to  proceed  to  administrative  organization  along 
lines  that  would  bring  financial  results.  The  money 
needed  for  economic  development  could  then  be 

133 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


solicited  and  obtained  from  Parliament  and  from 
private  capital. 

But  it  would  be  a  mistake  to  ignore  what  had  been 
accomplished  during  the  first  three  decades  of  the 
Third  Republic.  Three  achievements  prepared  the 
way  for  the  Aladdin's  lamp  transformation  that  has 
been  wrought  since  1900.  One  of  the  "keys  to  the 
house"'  was  secured  between  1881  and  1883  by  the 
invasion  of  Tunis  and  the  establishment  of  a  French 
Protectorate  over  the  territory  lying  between  Algeria 
and  the  Turkish  vilayet  of  Tripoli.  Intrepid  explor- 
ers and  brilliant  soldiers  carried  the  French  flag  from 
the  Senegal  to  the  Niger,  to  the  coast  through  Kong 
and  Dahomey,  and  from  Gaboon  to  the  Congo. 
Most  important  of  all,  the  conquered  of  Sedan  be- 
came the  conquerors  of  Northern  Africa  through 
learning  how  to  fight  natives  with  natives  and  by 
using  native  methods. 

West  Africa,  the  Sahara,  the  Sudan,  and  Equato- 
rial Africa  are  treated  in  later  chapters.  It  is  not  my 
intention  to  give  an  historical  outUne  of  Algeria  and 
Tunis,  but  to  indicate  the  changes  and  problems  and 
development  of  the  north  African  coast  under  the 
French  flag,  in  order  to  show  the  place  and  impor- 
tance of  what  has  happened  recently  in  Algeria  and 
Tunis  in  the  building  of  the  French  colonial  empire 
and  in  the  general  history  of  the  spread  of  European 
civilization  in  Africa.  For  here  we  find  the  secret  and 
the  impetus  of  the  movement  that  has  established  in 
fifteen  years  the  pax  Gallica  from  the  Mediterranean 

•  Jules  Ferry  called  Tunis  and  Morocco  the  keys  to  France's 
house  in  Africa. 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


to  the  Congo,  from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Anglo-Egyp- 
tian Sudan,  over  territories  inhabited  by  twenty- 
five  millions,  and  that  has  doubled  in  the  last  ten 
years  the  commerce  of  these  countries. 

Algeria  was  completely  conquered  during  the  reign 
of  Louis  Philippe.  For  sixty  years  it  was  governed 
directly  from  Paris.  After  1870,  the  French  en- 
deavored to  make  Algeria  an  integral  part  of  France. 
The  idea  was  to  colonize  this  country  with  French 
colonists,  and  to  make  of  it  the  panacea  and  compen- 
sation for  the  loss  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine.  The 
problem  was  exceedingly  difficult,  more  difficult,  in 
spite  of  its  nearness  to  the  mother  country,  than  any 
other  colonial  enterprise  ever  undertaken  by  a 
European  Power,  except,  perhaps,  the  Dutch  coloni- 
zation of  South  Africa.  In  America  and  in  Australia, 
French,  Spanish,  and  English  found  vast  territories 
with  rich  possibiUties  and  sparsely  inhabited.  The 
natives  were  primitive  and  rarely  settled  on  lands 
indispensable  to  their  support.  They  were  not  firmly 
rooted  to  the  soil.  They  were  not  bound  together 
by  social  and  political  organisms  that  had  developed 
with  the  exploitation  of  the  land  on  which  they  lived. 
Aboriginal  inhabitants  were  driven  into  the  interior, 
and  gradually  exterminated  or  assimilated.  In 
Algeria,  after  1870,  the  French  attempted  to  implant 
a  new  element  in  a  country  whose  lands  were  owned 
and  lived  upon  by  a  race  that  possessed  political  and 
social  institutions.  They  were  institutions,  too,  of 
a  highly  developed  character,  and  the  antithesis  of  the 
institutions  brought  by  the  colonists.  The  French 
were  tackhng  a  problem  that  European  Christians 

135 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


have  never  been  able  to  solve,  the  problem  of  recon- 
ciling Islam  and  Christianity.  It  was  altogether  a 
different  problem  from  that  of  colonizing  a  pagan 
country.  It  coiald  not  be  compared  at  all  to  most  of 
the  colonizing  attempts  in  Africa,  and  to  the  British 
in  India  or  the  Dutch  in  Java,  wJiere  the  idea  is  not 
to  implant  the  ruHng  race  in  the  country  ruled,  but 
merely  to  administer  the  country  and  exploit  its 
foreign  commerce  by  means  of  officials  and  traders. 
The  French  tried  to  make  Algeria  a  part  of  France, 
inhabited  by  Frenchmen  and  other  Europeans  and 
assimilated  natives,  speaking  the  French  language 
and  governed  by  French  laws. 

Napoleon's  idea  of  an  Arab  empire  was  abandoned. 
The  natives  could  not  be  assimilated.  Algeria  could 
not  be  held  indefinitely  as  a  vast  military  camp.  A 
European  element — for  the  most  part  French — must 
be  introduced,  given  means  of  acqmring  land,  and 
encouraged  to  come  and  stay  by  the  granting  of 
privileges  not  enjoyed  by  the  natives.  The  first 
step  was  the  law  of  1873  concerning  native  property. 
It  resulted  in  the  unjust  and  wholly  indefensible 
eviction  of  thousands  of  proprietors  from  their  lands. 
Then  followed  the  suppression  of  the  Moslem  system  of 
administering  justice  through  kadis,  which  resulted  in 
the  oppression  of  the  natives  and  the  awakening  of 
religious  antagonism.  The  third  step  was  the  exten- 
sion to  Algeria  of  the  new  French  municipal  law. 
This  put  the  government  of  communes  into  the  hands 
of  minor  officials  and  white  colonists,  who  became 
legally  the  masters  of  the  destinies  of  the  natives 
among  whom  they  lived.    All  sorts  of  advantages 

136 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


were  granted  to  colonists  to  bring  them  and  to  keep 
them  in  Algeria:  partial  exemption  from  military 
service,  partial  exemption  from  taxation,  and  a  gift 
of  lands  of  dispossessed  natives.  At  the  same  time, 
the  process  of  governing  from  Paris  resulted  in 
arrested  economic  development  and  administrative 
confusion.  The  Governor  of  Algeria  had  no  control 
over  the  mihtary  authorities.  Administrations,  de- 
pending upon  ministries  in  Paris,  were  directed  by 
considerations  and  governed  by  rules  totally  con- 
trary to  the  interests  of  Algeria  and  unsuited  to  its 
different  economic  and  poUtical  situation  and  its  pe- 
culiar problems.  There  was  no  coordination  of  policy 
and  effort  between  branches  of  the  Government.  Fi- 
nances were  managed  from  Paris,  revenues  collected  by 
Paris,  and  credits  voted  in  the  general  French  budget. 

Algeria  did  not  prosper.  The  natives  regarded  the 
French,  as  they  had  every  right  to  do,  as  gendarmes 
and  merchants  whose  one  thought  was  to  exploit 
them  and  to  treat  them  unjustly.  They  resented 
bitterly  a  regime  which  forced  intruders  upon  them, 
gave  the  intruders  exemption  from  military  service 
and  taxation,  and  imposed  upon  them  the  burdens 
from  which  the  intruders  were  free.  The  colonists 
felt  that  they  had  exchanged  the  orderly  civil  admin- 
istration at  home  for  a  half-baked,  improvised  un- 
certain regime  that  was  neither  military  nor  civil,  and 
under  which  they  did  not  know  exactly  where  they 
stood.  They  did  not  enjoy  all  the  rights  of  French 
citizens,  especially  in  the  matter  of  voting  upon  how 
the  money  they  paid  in  taxes  and  the  revenue  from 
the  wealth  they  created  should  be  spent. 

137 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Essential  reforms  were  enacted  after  Fashoda, 
reforms  that  have  brought  wealth  and  prosperity,  and 
make  the  days  of  the  nineteenth  century  seem  like  an 
ugly  dream. 

In  1898,  three  delegations,  to  be  elected  separately 
by  French  citizens,  tax-payers  other  than  citizens, 
and  natives,  were  established  to  decide  upon  the 
expenditure  of  the  tax-payers'  money.  This  was  the 
beginning  of  self-government.  But  it  had  no  real 
importance  imtil  the  law  of  December  24,  1900, 
separated  Algerian  from  French  finances,  and  estab- 
lished a  distinct  Algerian  budget.  The  Algerian 
delegations,  now  masters  of  their  finances,  discussed 
and  decided  how  their  money  should  be  spent.  The 
result  was  magical.  Immediately  there  was  an  ex- 
tension of  public  works.  Natives  as  well  as  colonists 
began  to  take  an  interest  in  their  coimtry.  Let  one 
illustration  suffice.  Before  1900,  the  forests  of 
Algeria  brought  in  only  several  hundred  thousand 
francs,  which  represented  fines  collected  from  natives. 
To-day  there  are  practically  no  fines.  But  forest 
products  figure  in  the  budget  for  more  than  five  mil- 
lion francs. 

Since  1900,  Algeria  has  become,  after  Great  Britain, 
Germany,  Belgium,  and  the  United  States,  the  best 
client  of  France.  Eighty  per  cent,  of  her  trade,  which 
amounts  to  nearly  $250,000,000  per  annum,  is  with 
the  mother  country.  Railways  have  been  extended 
so  that  Algeria,  whose  means  of  transportation  were 
limited  fifteen  years  ago,  has  now  two  thousand  miles 
in  exploitation.  This  has  meant  a  rapid  develop- 
ment of  mineral  wealth,  and  the  possibility  of  using 

138 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


forest  produce,  especially  cork.  The  great  prosper- 
ity of  Algeria,  however,  is  in  agriculture,  where  dry 
farming  has  brought  under  cultivation  cereal-bearing 
areas  that  the  natives  never  utiUzed.  The  most 
remarkable  phenomenon  in  Algeria,  from  the  stand- 
point of  the  colonists,  is  the  way  the  soil  takes  to 
vines.  Algerian  wine  has  become  a  factor  in  the 
French  markets,  and  brings  to  its  producers  financial 
returns  far  beyond  their  dreams.  Algeria  is  also 
looked  upon  as  a  most  important  source  of  mutton 
for  French  markets. 

Popular  education  was  established  in  Algeria  in 
1892,  and  is  more  extended  than  anywhere  else  in 
Africa  except  in  the  South  African  Commonwealth. 
Since  the  inhabitants  received  the  privilege  of  voting 
the  budget,  sums  are  allotted  that  would  make 
possible  primary  education  everywhere  were  it  not 
for  the  unfortunate  system  of  commimal  responsibil- 
ity.' There  are  still  a  hundred  thousand  boys  in 
populated  centers  who  have  no  school  facilities,  and 
little  has  been  done  to  educate  girls.  But  it  is  the 
will  of  the  Government  to  give  education  to  all,  and 

•  The  communes,  under  French  law,  collaborate  in  the  creation 
and  construction  of  schools,  and  nothing  can  be  accomplished  without 
local  cooperation.  Since  1908,  the  Government  has  been  giving  from 
eighty  to  one  hundred  per  cent,  of  the  funds  needed,  but  many  com- 
munes in  Algeria  have  not  availed  themselves  of  the  sums  appro- 
priated for  their  local  school  uses.  The  reform  urgently  needed,  now 
that  the  Govertmient  can  pay  out  of  the  general  budget  the  entire 
expense  of  native  schools,  is  to  have  the  control  taken  out  of  the 
hands  of  the  communes  and  vested  in  a  central  board  at  Algiers, 
which  shall  appropriate  the  money,  build  the  schools,  and  manage 
them.  Cf.  M.  Augustin  Bernard,  in  L'A frique  du  Nord  (Paris,  1913), 
PP-  52-3- 

139 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  funds  for  that  piirpose  are  provided.  In  the 
matter  of  schools  the  French  in  Algeria  have  felt 
much  more  keenly  their  stewardship  than  the  British 
in  Egypt.  The  effort  they  are  making  in  all  their 
colonies  is  rivaled  only  by  what  the  United  States 
is  doing  in  the  Philippines. 

But  education  brings  its  problems,  especially  in 
old  Moslem  countries  where  the  natives  believe  that 
they  are  superior  to  their  rulers.  In  their  attitude 
socially  toward  natives,  the  French  are  found  by 
subject  races  to  be  far  more  pleasant  to  Uve  with 
than  the  British.  Especially  among  the  upper 
classes  life  is  happier  and  richer  for  French  than  for 
British  subject  races.  The  moment  a  Moslem  is 
educated,  he  becomes  reasoningly  a  more  bitter 
enemy  of  the  Englishman  than  he  was  instinctively 
before.  He  hates  him  with  all  his  heart  and  soul. 
This  revelation  has  come  to  me  many  a  time,  at  a 
dinner  table  or  in  a  home  where  the  Moslem,  urbane 
and  charming,  was  guest  or  host.  His  eyes  tell  the 
story  his  lips  keep  back.  The  Moslem  knows  that 
the  Englishman  denies  him — and  always  will  deny 
him — social  equahty,  whether  he  be  Sultan  or  peasant. 
The  Frenchman  feels  no  racial  antipathy  for  the 
native  and  the  native  knows  it.  So  the  Frenchman 
has  not  as  much  to  fear  from  Moslem  education  as 
the  EngHshman.  His  poHtical  interest  does  not 
sufifer  greatly  by  the  spread  of  primary  education. 
Higher  education  of  native  races  is  not  a  nightmare  for 
him.  He  can  conceive  of  the  day  when  the  native 
holds  the  franchise,  full  and  free,  of  French  citizen- 
ship.   What  he  asks  is  that  the  native  learn  to  speak 

140 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


French  and  become  impregnated  with  French  ideals. 
His  only  fear  is  being  too  greatly  outnumbered  in  the 
midst  of  a  native  population. 

Between  1901  and  1905,  the  territory  of  Algeria  was 
greatly  extended  into  the  hinterland.  By  the  decree 
of  August  14,  1905,  Southern  Algeria  was  organized. 
It  includes  the  oases  on  the  northern  edge  of  the 
Sahara.  The  extension  of  the  railway  to  the  desert 
and  the  pacification  of  the  Sahara  enabled  the  civil 
authorities  to  take  over  much  sooner  than  was  antici- 
pated the  administration  of  the  Algerian  hinterland. 
Not  many  years  ago,  a  deputy  declared  in  the  Palais 
Bourbon  that  France  would  never  hold  Southern 
Algeria  in  any  other  way  than  by  mihtary  posts,  whose 
garrisons  would  be  afraid  to  go  out  for  a  walk  unless 
they  were  all  together  and  all  armed.  Garrisons  are 
few  to-day,  especially  since  they  are  needed  more  in 
France  than  in  Algeria.  The  savages  they  were 
fighting  fifteen  years  ago  are  now  their  comrades-in- 
arms before  Verdun.  Were  Tartarin  de  Tarascon 
to  return  to-day  "chez  les  tueurs"  he  could  go  right 
into  the  desert,  and  still  not  find  his  lions. 

Tunis  was  invaded  in  188 1.  The  treaty  estabhsh- 
ing  the  French  Protectorate  was  signed  in  1883.  The 
European  Powers  and  Turkey  were  confronted  with  a 
fait  accompli.  Great  Britain's  protests  were  loud 
and  violent  at  first,  but  died  down  after  the  occupa- 
tion of  Egypt.  Italy  alone  felt  the  full  force  of  the 
blow  of  seeing  France  so  close  to  her  shores,  in  a 
territory  historically  Italian,  and  whose  European 
inhabitants  were  mostly  ItaHan.  The  "perfidy"  of 
France  drove  Italy  into  the  Triple  Alliance.    Only  in 

141 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


1 90 1  did  the  breach  begin  to  be  healed  by  France 
giving  tacit  permission  to  Italy  to  do  likewise  some 
day  in  Tripoli.  The  family  that  had  been  reigning, 
under  the  suzerainty  of  Turkey,  since  the  beginning 
of  the  eighteenth  century,  was  wise  enough  to  bow 
to  the  inevitable,  and  has  been  maintained  on  the 
throne.  Tunis  is  controled  by  a  Resident,  who  is 
Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  in  the  cabinet  of  the  Bey. 

The  progress  of  Tunis  began  to  be  marked  before 
that  of  any  other  French  colony.  Its  railways  in- 
creased far  more  rapidly  than  those  of  Algeria,  and 
its  economic  prosperity  began  early  enough  to  con- 
found in  active  public  life  those  who  opposed  the 
acquisition  of  the  Protectorate  and  the  grants  of 
money  in  the  eighties  and  early  nineties.  A  network 
of  excellent  railways  stretches  along  the  coast,  and 
serves  the  interior.  Sfax  has  become  a  marvelous 
center  of  olive  culture.  Wheat,  barley,  and  oats  are 
grown  on  large  plantations.  Lead,  zinc,  and  iron 
are  mined  extensively,  and  the  phosphates  production 
is  of  mondial  importance. 

The  reasons  for  the  more  rapid  development  of 
Tunis  than  of  Algeria  are  mostly  political.  Tunis 
was  administered  from  the  beginning  through  the 
French  Foreign  Office.  Italians  in  the  colony  were 
plentiful,  and  Italy  took  the  French  occupation  to 
heart.  It  was  imperative  for  France  to  show  both 
the  Italians  of  Tunis  and  the  whole  world  how  much 
better  off  the  country  was  under  the  French  flag,  and 
to  reconcile  the  Tunisians  themselves  to  their  loss  of 
independence.  Sums  were  voted  for  railway  building 
and  port  construction  and  the  development  of  indus- 

142 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


tries,  steamship  communications  were  established 
and  freight  rates  arranged,  that  would  never  have 
been  put  through  on  so  large  a  scale  on  the  ground  of 
purely  financial  return.  Budget  estimates  for  Tunis 
were  railroaded  through  the  Chamber  of  Deputies 
year  after  year  on  the  plea  of  the  urgent  necessities 
and  considerations  of  foreign  policy  and  national 
defense. 

Fortunately,  French  energy  and  push  and  skill, 
and  a  masterly  way  of  handling  the  native  ruler  and 
Moslem  religious  leaders,  have  enabled  French 
officials  to  make  excellent  budget  returns,  and  to 
report  each  year  a  remarkable  agricultural  and  com- 
mercial development.  Lands  that  Islam  had  ren- 
dered sterile  were  returned  to  the  old  prosperity  of 
Roman  days,  not  slowly  and  laboriously,  but  rapidly 
and  as  if  by  magic.  The  economic  reward  France 
gets  from  Tunis  has  nothing  of  luck  in  it.  It  is 
richly  deserved. 

At  the  same  time  the  political  advantages  of  hold- 
ing Tunis  are  incalculable.  The  other  "key  to  the 
house,"  Morocco,  being  off  in  the  farthest  comer  of 
the  African  continent,  with  Algeria  and  the  desert 
between  it  and  the  rest  of  Islam,  never  meant — even 
potentially — more  than  local  disturbances  for  France. 
Tunis,  independent  or  under  the  control  of  another 
Power,  would  have  destroyed  the  possibility  of  a 
strong  and  easily  defended  French  African  empire. 
The  importance  of  its  possession  by  France  was  de- 
monstrated when  the  Pan-Islamic  propaganda  began 
to  be  agitated  by  Abdul  Hamid,  and  taken  up  by 
Germany.    Without  Tunis,  France  could  not  have 

143 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


pacified  the  Sahara  and  installed  herself  in  the  Sudan.  ^ 
Tunis,  also,  has  offset  for  France  the  advantage 
gained  after  the  Napoleonic  wars  by  Great  Britain 
in  the  possession  of  the  island  of  Malta.  To  wrest 
in  the  future  from  Great  Britain  the  naval  supremacy 
of  the  Mediterranean,  France  needs  only  the  ships. 
She  has  in  Bizerta  the  base  looking  westward,  and 
the  Tunisian  coast  line  lends  itself  easily  to  another 
base  looking  eastward. 

If  the  French  are  to  realize  their  dreams  of  making 
Algeria  and  Morocco  and  Tunis  true  pays  de  France, 
the  very  crux  of  their  problem  is  building  up  French 
communities  all  along  the  Barbary  coast  from  Sfax 
to  Agadir.  Ten  million  Moslem  natives  can  never 
be  French-speaking  and  French-thinking  unless  they 
are  in  constant  daily  contact  with  Frenchmen — not 
ofificials  and  soldiers,  but  colonists  whose  fortunes 
are  as  much  bound  up  in  the  country  as  theirs.  Any 
other  method  of  making  these  Mediterranean  coun- 
tries French  is  bound  to  meet  with  .dismal  failure. 
Colonization  cannot  stand  where  it  is.  The  native 
problem,  the  economic  problem,  the  pacifying  prob- 
lem all  depend  upon  one  and  the  same  thing — a. 
great  and  widespread  increase  of  the  European  ele- 
ment. The  peculiar  nationalistic  ideal  of  the  French 
owners  demands  that  the  new  colonists  be  in  over- 
whelming proportion  French  families. 

According  to  the  last  census,  Algeria  has  five  and  a 
half  million  inhabitants,  and  Tunis  nearly  two  million. 
In  Algeria  there  are  seven  hundred  and  fifty  thousand 
Europeans,  of  whom  three  hundred  thousand  are 

'See above,  pp.  121. 

144 


ALGERIA  AND  TUNIS 


French.  Tunis  contains  two  hundred  thousand  Euro- 
peans, of  whom  less  than  fifty  thousand  are  French. 
With  all  the  increase  of  wealth  of  these  two  posses- 
sions, the  French  element  has  not  greatly  increased 
since  1900.  French  capital  and  French  enterprise  have 
doubled,  but  the  Europeans  employed  in  minor  un- 
official positions  are  generally  Italians  or  Spaniards. 
They  become  often  French  citizens — but  that  does 
not  make  them  French.  It  is  in  vain  that  the  French 
flag  flies  over  Tunis.  Its  European  civilian  element 
is  distinctively  Italian.  Every  Frenchman  who  visits 
Tunis  sees  this  with  a  sinking  of  the  heart.'  In 
Morocco,  France  is  dependent  on  Spaniards.  During 
the  past  twenty-five  years  the  native  population  of 
Algeria  and  Tunis  has  increased  thirty  per  cent.  In 
the  same  period  the  demographic  chart  of  France 
has  been  very  nearly  stationary.  It  is  no  reflection 
on  the  work  of  the  best  soldiers  in  the  world  and 
brilliant  administrators,  models  of  patriotism  and 
self  sacrifice,  to  say  that  their  work  has  not  brought — 
from  the  standpoint  of  permanency  and  hope  for  the 
future — what  it  should  have  brought.  The  fault  lies 
with  their  fellow-countrymen.  The  work  of  those 
who  go  out  with  the  sword  and  the  pen  into  Africa 
cannot  be  worth  what  it  should  be  to  France  as  long 

'The  191 1  figures  for  Tunis  (official  French  census)  give  46,044 
French,  exclusive  of  the  Army  of  Occupation  but  inclusive  of  civilian 
officials;  109,143  Italians;  and  12,410  "Anglo-Maltese."  The  last 
category  is,  of  course,  also  Italian.  This  means  that  nearly  125,000 
Itahans  are  settled  in  Tunis.  In  Algeria  there  are  nearly  the  same 
number  of  Spaniards.  Figures  have  not  yet  been  published  for  the 
French  Protectorate  of  Morocco.  The  French,  however,  are  in  a 
minority  to  other  Europeans  all  along  the  Barbary  coast. 

145 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


as  the  French  nation  refuses  to  rear  children  to  take 
possession  of  the  heritage. 

The  warning  to  France,  especially  at  this  moment 
when  the  best  of  her  young  manhood  is  being  sacri- 
ficed on  the  battlefield,  is  one  of  poignant  force. 
Military  victories  and  the  great  colonial  empire 
mean  nothing  unless  there  is  a  new  generation  to 
benefit  by  the  sacrifices,  the  glory,  and  the  success  of 
those  who  are  giving  their  blood.  If  after  the  fathers 
come  not  the  children,  nothing  comes. 


146 


CHAPTER  VIII 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 

STANLEY'S  Congo  River  trip  resulted  in  the 
establishment,  in  1882,  of  the  Congo  Free 
State,  which  was  placed  under  the  sovereignty 
of  its  founder,  Leopold  II.,  King  of  the  Belgians.  Its 
neutrality  and  independence  were  guaranteed  by  the 
Berlin  Act  of  1885,  and  during  the  next  decade,  as 
knowledge  of  Central  Africa  became  more  precise, 
its  boundaries  were  defined  by  treaties  with  Great 
Britain,  Germany,  Portugal,  and  France,  who  hold 
the  neighboring  territories.  With  the  exception  of 
the  small  British  Protectorate  of  Uganda,  and  a  spur 
of  German  East  Africa,  which  stands  between  the 
Belgian  Congo  and  Lake  Victoria,  this  vast  colony 
of  over  nine  hundred  thousand  square  miles  may  be 
said  to  cover  the  heart  of  Africa.  For  over  two 
thousand  miles  it  is  the  territory  comprising  the 
Congo  River  and  its  tributaries,  and  might  have 
continued  to  include  both  banks  of  the  Congo,  had 
not  the  French  explorer  de  Brazza  anticipated  Stan- 
ley by  planting  the  French  flag  on  the  north  bank 
of  the  river  opposite  Leopoldville.  Like  the  Niger, 
although  on  a  far  larger  scale,  the  Congo  finds  its 
way  to  the  sea  in  a  most  unusual  course,  due  north 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


for  half  its  length  through  the  very  center  of  Africa, 
then  west  for  five  hundred  miles,  and  then  almost 
south  for  the  last  thousand.  In  the  central  bend,  for 
a  stretch  of  considerably  over  a  thousand  miles,  the 
Congo  is  navigable.  Steamers  can  rim  also  on  its 
principal  tributaries.  This  has  facilitated  the  pro- 
blem of  communication,  and  as  in  the  Niger,  Nile, 
and  Zambesi  valleys,  has  made  less  expensive  and 
more  rapid  the  work  of  developing  and  colonizing. 

The  larger  portion  of  the  boundary  with  German 
East  Africa  is  formed  by  Lake  Tanganika,  and  the 
completion  of  the  German  railway  from  the  lake  to 
Dar-es-Salaam  has  given  the  eastern  portion  of  the 
Congo  an  excellent  outlet  to  the  Indian  Ocean. 
Southward  there  is  railway  communication  through 
Rhodesia  to  Beira  on  the  Indian  Ocean  coast  of 
Portuguese  East  Africa  and  through  the  Common- 
wealth of  South  Africa  to  Cape  Town  and  Durban. 
The  southern  region  of  the  Belgian  Congo  will  soon 
be  connected  with  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  also  by  the 
railway  from  Katanga  to  Benguela  in  Portuguese 
West  Africa. 

Since  the  readjustment  of  territory  between  France 
and  Germany  after  the  Agadir  crisis  of  191 1,  German 
Kamerun  touches  the  northwestern  boundary  of  the 
Congo  at  two  points.  Belgian  Congo  shares  with 
British  Uganda,  Lake  Edward  and  Lake  Albert,  and 
touches  the  Nile  at  the  northern  end  of  Lake  Albert. 
Until  the  death  of  King  Leopold,  the  Belgians  held 
also  the  Lado  Enclave  which  had  the  west  bank  of 
the  Nile  for  some  distance  north  of  Lake  Albert. 
On  the  Atlantic  coast,  the  Congo  is  hemmed  in  north 

148 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


and  south  by  Portuguese  territory,  but  has  a  free 
outlet  to  the  Atlantic  at  the  Port  of  Boma  near  the 
mouth  of  the  Congo  River. 

Belgian  Congo  is  inhabited  by  about  fifteen  mil- 
lion natives  of  numerous  tribes  and  dialects,  the 
great  bulk  of  whom  are  pagan.  Mohammedanism 
and  Christianity  have  made  little  progress  in  Belgian 
territory. 

The  history  of  the  Congo  during  the  first  ten 
years  of  the  twentieth  century  is  one  of  the  saddest 
and  most  revolting  pages  of  modem  history.  Were  it 
not  for  the  fact  that  it  has  so  essential  a  part  in  the 
study  of  European  colonial  problems  in  Africa,  one 
would  gladly  pass  it  over  in  silence.  For  at  the 
present  moment  the  wrongs  and  sufferings  of  Belgium 
have  awakened  the  indignation  and  sympathy  of  the 
whole  world.  Neutral  nations  may  be  divided  in 
their  attitude  toward  many  things  the  AlHes  are 
fighting  for  and  hope  to  win.  But  they  are  united 
in  their  desire  to  see  the  Belgians  restored  to  inde- 
pendence, and  compensated  for  what  they  have 
endured  and  are  enduring.  But  one  who  under- 
takes to  set  forth  a  historical  record,  especially  when 
it  is  his  object  to  establish  facts  and  principles  that 
must  serve  as  a  guide  for  the  solution  of  problems 
which  the  near  future  is  going  to  bring  into  the  lime- 
light, cannot  allow  himself  to  be  swayed  by  senti- 
mental or  partisan  considerations. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century,  the 
convention  of  1890  between  Belgium  and  the  Congo 
Free  State  was  about  to  expire.  The  question  of 
annexation  was  raised  in  Belgium,  and  in  the  rest  oj 

149 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  world  that  oj  the  Belgian' s  fitness  to  he  the  stewards  of 
so  large  and  important  a  part  oJ  the  African  continent. 
There  had  long  been  a  suspicion  that  Livingstone's 
dream  of  Central  Africa  for  Christ  had  been  super- 
seded by  the  actuality  of  Central  Africa  for  rubber, 
and  that  European  penetration  of  the  Dark  Con- 
tinent, far  from  bringing  civilization  and  happiness 
to  the  natives,  had  brought  them  barbarism  and 
misery.  In  1901,  while  the  press  of  Brussels  was 
discussing  the  conflict  between  King  Leopold  and 
Belgian  politicians  over  annexation,  the  London  press 
was  full  of  statements  of  English  travelers  about 
scandalous  management,  tribal  troubles,  and  coer- 
cion of  natives  by  traders  and  Congo  officials.  In 
1902,  Morel's  book,  The  Affairs  of  West  Africa, 
brought  the  agitation  in  England  to  such  a  point 
that  the  British  Foreign  Office  sounded  the  signato- 
ries of  the  Berlin  Act  as  to  the  advisability  of  a  com- 
mon move  to  put  an  end  to  the  maladministration  of 
the  Congo  Free  State.  Failing  to  secure  agreement 
among  the  Powers,  the  British  Government  in  1903 
decided  to  act  independently,  and  made  strong 
diplomatic  representations  at  Brussels.  Belgium 
was  told  that  this  action  was  prompted  not  by  tales 
of  travelers  and  missionaries,  but  by  reports  from 
British  consuls,  one  corroborating  the  other,  in  such 
a  fashion  that  the  evidence  could  not  be  controverted. 

The  Belgian  public  took  this  move  in  very  bad 
part.  There  was  a  strong  feeling  throughout  Bel- 
gium that  England's  motive  was  the  desire  to  appro- 
priate the  fruit  of  the  work  which  had  converted  the 
Congo  into  a  rich  domain.    Discoveries  of  gold 

150 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 

had  just  been  reported  from  the  Congo  basin.  The 
analogy  emphasized  by  the  Belgians  between  this 
coincidence  and  the  British  treatment  of  the  Trans- 
vaal Boers  makes  very  curious  reading  now,  and  goes 
to  show  how  Belgium,  just  as  Russia  and  France, 
have  awakened  only  recently — when  it  was  their  in- 
terest to  do  so — to  the  fact  that  the  British  are  cham- 
pions of  liberty  and  right  and  the  freedom  of  small 
nationalities.  In  fact,  one  can  find  less  than  ten 
years  ago  editors  of  serious  Belgian  newspapers 
declaring  that  Germany  par  excellence  of  all  the 
Powers  was  free  from  suspicion  of  interestedness  in 
her  dealings  with  small  nations!  All  the  Belgian 
parties,  with  the  exception  of  the  Socialists,  concurred 
in  supporting  King  Leopold's  management  of  the 
Congo  Free  State.  In  the  face  of  indubitable  testi- 
mony of  horrible  cruelties  and  barbarity  of  Belgian 
officials,  the  Chamber  voted  by  ninety-one  to  thirty- 
five  the  following  motion:  "The  Chamber,  confiding, 
in  agreement  with  the  Government,  in  the  normal 
and  progressive  development  of  the  Congo  Free 
State,  under  the  aegis  of  the  King,  passes  to  the  order 
of  the  day. " 

In  February,  1904,  the  British  Foreign  Office  pub- 
I  lished  the  report  of  the  investigation  made  at  its 
j  command  by  Mr.  Casement,  consul  at  Boma.  Mr. 
]  Casement  said  that  the  Congo  Free  State  had  failed 
to  govern  according  to  the  provisions  of  the  Berlin 
Act,  that  the  officials  were  deficient  in  their  control 
of  subordinates,  that  the  suffering  of  the  natives, 
through  the  unchecked  commercial  greed  of  the 
Europeans,  was  terrible  beyond  words.    Mr.  Case- 

151 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ment  had  the  advantage  of  being  able  to  make  a 
comparison  of  present  with  former  conditions  from 
previous  personal  knowledge  of  the  country.  In  one 
district  where  he  had  seen  five  thousand  people  in 
1887,  there  were  less  than  six  hundred  in  1903. 
Towns  and  villages  on  Lake  Mantumba  had  dimin- 
ished sixty  to  seventy  per  cent,  in  ten  years.  In  six 
months  on  the  Momboya  River  the  lowest  estimate 
of  people  killed  or  mutilated  by  having  their 
right  hand  cut  off  was  six  thousand,  and  this  did  not 
include  the  children,  whom  the  soldiers  were  in- 
structed to  kill  with  the  butt  of  their  rifles  so  as 
not  to  waste  cartridges. 

One  loses  all  patience  with  the  blind  partisans  who 
declare  to-day  that  subsequent  events  have  proved 
the  falsity  of  this  report,  simply  because  Mr.  Case- 
ment, afterwards  Sir  Roger  Casement,  conspired 
against  the  British  in  Ireland,  and  was  hanged  as  a 
traitor.  None  who  ever  came  in  contact  with  Sir 
Roger  Casement — whether  they  agreed  with  him  on 
the  Irish  question  or  not — can  possibly  impugn  the 
sincerity  of  his  motives,  or  regard  him  in  any  other 
light  than  as  a  patriot  of  unimpeachable  character. 
Like  Battista  and  Sauro,  whom  the  Austrians  re- 
cently executed  and  whom  the  Italians  are  mourning, 
Sir  Roger  was  a  victim  of  the  inevitable  forces  that 
have  been  awakened  during  the  present  transforma- 
tion of  the  world.  But  even  if  one  throws  out  the 
Casement  report,  what  is  he  to  do  with  the  memo- 
randum of  Lord  Cromer,  published  by  the  British 
Government  at  the  same  time  ?  When  Lord  Cromer 
visited  the  Upper  Nile  early  in  1903,  he  saw  the  horror 

152 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 

of  Belgian  rule  with  his  own  eyes.  He  declared  that 
the  population  of  the  Belgian  bank  of  the  Nile  was 
practically  extinct,  that  the  Belgians  were  hated  and 
feared  so  that  no  Belgian  officer  could  move  outside 
of  the  settlements  without  a  strong  guard,  that  the 
natives  fled  from  the  Belgian  officials,  that  the  Bel- 
gian soldiers  were  allowed  full  liberty  to  plunder  and 
rarely  made  payment  for  suppHes.  To  quote  exactly 
the  opinion  of  Lord  Cromer,  I  give  the  conclusion  of 
his  observations  in  his  own  words:  "It  appears  to  me 
that  the  facts  which  I  have  stated  afford  sufficient 
evidence  of  the  spirit  which  animates  the  Belgian 
administration,  if  indeed  it  can  be  called  adminis- 
tration. The  Government,  as  far  as  I  could  judge,  is 
conducted  almost  exclusively  on  commercial  prin- 
ciples, and  even  judged  by  that  standard,  it  would 
appear  that  those  principles  are  somewhat  short- 
sighted." 

In  the  debate  in  the  House  of  Commons  on  the 
Casement  and  Cromer  reports,  many  members  in- 
sisted that  England  was  bound,  by  her  signature 
attached  to  the  Berlin  Act,  to  intervene,  and  one 
member  (Lord  Edmond  Fitzmorris)  believed  that 
the  Belgian  reply  to  the  British  representations  justi- 
fied naval  action  against  Boma.  But  what  Govern- 
ment in  the  history  of  the  world  has  ever  intervened 
by  force  to  honor  its  signature  to  a  treaty  except 
when  its  own  interests  were  vitally  at  stake? Sir 

'  One  searches  history  in  vain  for  a  single  precedent  of  the  action 
that  political  opponents  of  President  Wilson  declared  he  was  bound 
by  The  Hague  Convention  to  take  when  Germany  violated  Belgian 
neutrality.    I  wrote  at  the  time,  and  have  since  written  and  still 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Edward  Grey,  who  was  then  of  the  Opposition,  sup- 
ported the  policy  of  the  Government  on  the  floor  of 
the  House  of  Commons,  and  agreed  that  Great  Brit- 
ain could  act  only  in  common  with  all  the  Powers. 
He  said  that  the  Berlin  Act  ought  to  be  revised. 

Indignation  in  Belgium  over  the  Casement  and 
Cromer  reports  and  the  House  of  Commons  debate 
was  even  greater  than  in  the  previous  year.  The 
Belgian  public  persisted  in  believing  that  the  British 
were  not  at  all  moved  by  "the  fair  fame  of  European 
civilization  at  stake, "  as  Lord  Percy  had  said.  They 
scouted  the  cruelty  charges.  They  denied  in  toto 
Lord  Cromer's  observations,  and  believed  that  Eng- 
land wanted  to  grab  the  Congo  as  she  had  grabbed 
the  Transvaal  and  the  Orange  Free  State. 

Another  book  written  by  Mr.  Morel,  called  King 
Leopold's  Rule  in  Africa,  proved  from  comparing 
the  value  of  exports  and  imports  that  there  was  no 
fair  trade  between  natives  and  their  task-masters. 
From  1898  to  1902  considerably  over  thirty-five 
million  dollars  of  exports,  chiefly  rubber,  were  offset 
by  only  seventeen  million  dollars  of  imports.  The 
figures  of  1903  showed  a  worse  exploitation:  exports 
nearly  eleven  million  dollars  and  imports  less  than 
four  million  three  hundred  thousand  dollars.  As 
much  was  being  imported  for  construction  and  devel- 


believe,  that  it  would  have  been  a  great  and  wise  move,  for  the  sake 
of  humanity,  if  Mr.  Wilson  had  protested.  But  that  he  was  bound 
to  protest  is  nonsense.  The  statement  that  he  brought  dishonor 
and  shame  upon  the  United  States  by  not  protesting,  when  not  made 
by  an  ignorant  man  or  a  man  unaccustomed  to  think,  is  hysteria 
pure  and  simple. 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


opment  purposes  and  for  the  use  of  Europeans,  what 
did  the  natives,  who  were  paid  in  goods,  receive  in 
exchange  for  the  rubber  they  brought  in?  The 
cynical  and  heartless  exploitation  of  the  natives  could 
be  possible  only  through  the  connivance  of  the  Bel- 
gian officials.  It  was  a  more  serious  question  than 
that  of  a  weak  and  incapable  administration.  The 
provisions  of  the  international  agreement  by  which 
King  Leopold  had  been  entrusted  wdth  the  Congo 
Free  State  were  ignored.  There  was  not  even  the 
pretense  of  living  up  to  them. 

PubHc  opinion  throughout  the  world  was  now  so 
thoroughly  aroused  that  a  Commission  of  Inquiry, 
with  unlimited  powers,  was  appointed,  composed  of 
a  high  Belgian  Magistrate,  the  President  of  the  Court 
of  Appeal  in  Boma,  and  a  Swiss.  Its  report,  issued 
in  November,  1905,  after  the  Government  had 
braced  up  the  administration  as  a  result  of  the  recent 
disclosures,  emphasized  the  suppression  of  slave 
trade,  cannibalism,  and  human  sacrifices,  the  exten- 
sive establishment  of  railways,  steamers,  and  tele- 
graph, and  the  wonderful  development  of  Leopoldville 
as  a  trading  center,  and  remarked  that  the  Congo 
villages  "recalled  seaside  towns  in  Europe,  with  their 
schools  and  hospitals."  On  the  other  hand,  there 
were  abuses,  certain  "unfortunate  populations" 
being  subjected  to  forcible  porterage  of  enormous 
burdens.  They  were  "menaced  with  partial  de- 
struction." There  was  oppression  in  the  collection 
of  rubber,  although  it  had  been  much  reduced  in 
the  King's  private  domain.  Female  hostages  were 
imprisoned  when  villages  did  not  bring  in  the  stipu- 

155 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


lated  amount  of  rubber;  defaulters  were  lashed; 
black  sentinels  were  placed  over  rubber  gatherers; 
and  military  attacks — by  Government  troops — on 
defaulting  villages  were  reported  officially  as  if  they 
were  expeditions  into  an  enemy's  country.  Some 
companies,  which  held  extensive  concessions,  were 
openly  denounced.  By  "defaulter"  is  meant  a 
native  who  does  not  bring  in  the  amount  of  rubber 
arbitrarily  allotted  to  him. 

The  sum  and  substance  of  the  report  of  the  Com- 
mission is  identical  with  that  of  Casement  and  other 
British  consuls  and  of  travelers  and  missionaries,  to 
wit:  The  Congo  Free  State  allowed  the  natives  of 
Central  Africa,  in  defiance  of  the  obligations  under- 
taken at  the  time  of  the  constitution  of  the  country, 
to  be  held  in  slavery  worse  than  anything  they  had 
ever  known.  Not  only  did  the  Government  counte- 
nance the  compulsion  and  oppression  practiced  by  the 
companies  who  held  concessions  and  in.  the  King's 
private  domain,  but  they  aided  in  putting  down 
"rebellions"  when  the  natives  arose  in  desperation 
against  their  white  task-masters;  or  refused,  without 
violence,  to  work  as  hard  as  they  were  asked  to;  or 
even  were  unable,  through  lack  of  rubber,  to  find 
the  amount  imposed  upon  them.  The  natives  were 
allowed  to  be  tortured  and  maimed  and  slaughtered 
wholesale. 

King  Leopold,  upon  the  publication  of  the  report, 
said  that  from  the  beginning  his  motive  in  Africa 
had  been  philanthropic  rather  than  commercial,  that 
he  was  glad  "abuses"  had  been  exposed,  and  that 
he  intended  to  appoint  a  new  commission  to  devise 

156 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


practical  measures  for  carrying  out  the  recommenda- 
tions of  the  Commission  of  Inquiry  for  reforming  the 
administration  and  ameliorating  the  lot  of  the  natives 
whose  interest  he  had  always  had  at  heart.  There 
was  Httle  faith  in  King  Leopold's  sincerity,  and  in  the 
desire  of  the  Belgian  Government  and  the  will  of  the 
Belgian  people  to  put  an  end  to  the  scandal.  When 
concessions  were  granted  to  American  syndicates,  it 
was  interpreted  as  an  effort  on  the  part  of  the  King 
to  anticipate  interference  from  the  United  States 
Government. 

On  December  4,  1907,  the  Belgian  Government 
presented  to  the  Chamber  a  treaty  between  King 
Leopold  and  Belgium,  ceding  the  Congo  Free  State 
to  Belgium.  After  some  modifications  the  treaty 
was  accepted  by  the  Chamber  and  the  Senate  in  the 
summer  of  1908.  Belgium  took  over  the  Congo, 
agreeing  to  pay  allowances  to  Princess  Clementine 
and  Prince  Albert  and  ten  million  dollars  to  the  King 
in  fifteen  annual  payments,'  but  refused  to  be  re- 
sponsible for  the  Congo  Free  State  debt  of  nearly 
twenty-three  million  dollars.  At  the  same  time, 
the  status  of  the  colony  was  established  by  a 

'  The  sum  guaranteed  to  King  Leopold  and  his  successors  was  to 
be  spent  "for  the  benefit  of  the  Congo, "  and  the  allowances  to  Prin- 
cess Clementine  and  Prince  Albert  to  cease  on  the  marriage  of  tiie 
former  and  the  accession  of  the  latter.  In  the  original  treaty,  King 
Leopold  had  made  unacceptable  reservations  about  the  way  the 
revenues  of  the  Crown  domains  were  to  be  spent.  He  wanted  to 
establish,  at  the  expense  of  the  Congo,  a  sort  of  combined  Rockefeller 
and  Carnegie  Foundation,  for  the  jiromotion  of  scientific  knowledge 
and  the  good  of  the  inhabitants  of  Belgium  and  the  Congo,  which 
would  have  been  a  serious  drain  on  the  resources  of  the  new  colony. 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


special  law,  and  provision  made  for  its  government. 
Europe  was  faced  with  a  fait  accompli.  But  did  not 
the  signatory  powers  have  to  recognize  the  validity 
of  this  transfer?  In  1885  they  had  constituted  a 
free  and  independent  state,  and  guaranteed  its  perpetual 
neutrality. 

The  British  Government  published  a  parliamen- 
tary paper  on  November  ist,  by  which  Sir  Edward 
Grey  is  shown  to  have  stated  the  unwillingness  of 
Great  Britain  to  recognize  the  annexation  until 
assurances  were  given  concerning  the  future.  She 
had  neighboring  territories,  which  could  be  affected 
by  a  continuance  of  weak  and  unjust  government  in 
the  Congo.  The  government  of  the  Congo  Free  State 
had  been  notoriously  different  from  that  of  all  contiguous 
colonies  for  many  years.  Belgium  was  pressed  for 
definite  assurances  with  regard  to  native  rights  and 
commercial  privileges  of  other  nations  in  the  Congo. 
On  December  23d,  the  London  newspapers  con- 
tained a  memorandum,  signed  by  the  most  prom- 
inent men  in  England,  expressing  approval  of  Sir 
Edward  Grey's  stand  and  declaring  that  Great 
Britain  must  insist  that  Belgium  give  a  definite 
guarantee  for  the  assurance  of  native  rights  in  land 
and  in  collection  of  forest  produce. 

In  sharp  contrast  to  the  British  attitude,  Germany 
recognized  immediately  the  transfer.  Foreign  Secre- 
tary von  Schoen  told  the  Reichstag  on  January  23, 
1909,  that  Germany  had  been  the  first  of  all  the 
Powers  to  recognize  the  transfer  of  the  Congo  to 
Belgium,  and  that  though  her  acquiescence  to  the 
annexation  did  not  imply  approval  of  existing  con- 

158 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


ditions,  Germany  assumed,  and  was  convinced,  that 
under  Belgian  rule  a  cleansing  process  would  ensue. 
Herr  von  Schoen  stated  explicitly  that  Germany  had 
not  considered  herself  entitled  by  treaty  to  interfere, 
as  Great  Britain  had  asked  her  to  join  in  doing,  to 
secure  the  introduction  of  Congo  reforms.  He  gave 
an  outline  of  the  two  treaties  (that  with  the  inter- 
national Congo  Association  and  the  Congo  Articles 
in  the  Berlin  Conference  Act),  and  showed  that  the 
signatory  Powers  had  no  right  to  a  voice  in  the  mat- 
ter. In  Belgium  Germany's  attitude  was  deeply 
appreciated. 

During  1909  the  United  States  and  Great  Britain 
continued  to  correspond  with  the  Belgian  Govern- 
ment, maintaining  in  common  that  the  annexation 
could  not  be  recognized  until  definite  guarantees 
were  given  on  the  subject  of  the  exploitation  of 
natives.  But  Belgium  took  her  cue  from  Austria- 
Hungary's  recent  action  in  Bosnia  and  Herzegovina. 
International  agreements  are  not  worth  the  paper 
they  are  written  on.  The  transfer  was  celebrated 
at  Antwerp  by  a  colonial  festival.  King  Leopold 
made  a  speech  in  which  he  was  silent  on  the  native 
question,  but  held  up  glowingly  the  commercial 
advantages  to  Belgium,  urged  the  development  of  the 
merchant  marine,  and  invited  capitalists  to  take  up 
concessions  in  the  Congo.  At  that  very  moment,  the 
Socialists  in  the  Chamber  exposed  the  fact  that  one 
of  the  first  decrees  of  the  new  Colonial  Minister 
was  to  impress  twenty-six  hundred  natives  for  railway 
construction.  The  Colonial  Minister  justified  forced 
labor  on  the  ground  of  urgency  and  said  that  the 

159 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


natives  had  no  reason  to  complain,  as  the  railway 
would  be  useful  to  them  as  well  as  to  Belgium.  His 
position  was  endorsed  by  the  Chamber. 

Belgian  promises  were  still  not  believed  in  England. 
Sir  Edward  Grey  declared  that  Great  Britain  would 
never  have  recognized  the  Congo  Free  State  at  all, 
if  she  had  known  what  it  was  going  to  become,  and 
that  she  would  not  now  recognize  it  until  she  was 
sure  that  conditions  would  be  radically  reformed. 
But  when  it  was  suggested  several  months  later  that 
the  British  navy  blockade  the  mouth  of  the  Congo 
as  a  protest  against  the  annexation,  Sir  Edward  was 
frank  in  stating  that  allowing  Belgium  to  rule  the 
country  was  the  ultimate  solution.  All  the  British 
wanted  was  a  practical  expression  of  willingness  on 
the  part  of  the  Belgians  to  act  decently  in  the  Congo. 
When  I  say  "the  British,"  I  mean  not  merely  the 
Government  but  enlightened  public  sentiment,  which 
in  this  matter  dictated  the  Government's  policy 
irrespective  of  international  political  consideration. 
On  November  19,  1909,  the  demonstration  at  Albert 
Hall  must  have  been  a  warning  to  Belgium  that  a 
solution  of  the  Congo  question  was  necessary,  if 
good  relations  were  to  be  maintained.  The  Albert 
Hall  demonstration  was  presided  over  by  the  Primate, 
assisted  by  nine  bishops,  leading  nonconformists, 
many  peers,  and  about  fifty  members  of  Parliament. 
The  Primate  and  the  Bishop  of  Oxford  expressed 
faith  in  the  good  intentions  of  the  Belgian  people, 
but  denounced  in  most  unqualified  terms  the  admin- 
istration, the  ill  will,  the  bad  faith,  and  the  atrocities 
in  the  Congo,  declaring  that  King  Leopold  was  per- 

160 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


sonally  and  beyond  any  doubt  responsible  for  them. 
The  Bishop  of  London  formulated  the  British  de- 
mands: ill  treatment  of  natives  must  cease,  land  be 
restored  to  them,  proper  soldiers  and  police  substi- 
tuted for  the  rubber-collecting  bullies  and  assassins, 
"hostage  houses"  done  away  with,  the  method  pro- 
posed for  abolishing  taxes  explained,  decimation  of 
natives  stopped,  and  the  promises  made  at  the  time 
of  annexation  immediately  fulfilled. 

It  is  well  to  remind  those  who  are  arguing  to-day 
(and  there  are  many  of  them)  that  in  continuing  the 
Congo  agitation  after  the  Belgian  annexation  the 
British  public  was  imposed  upon  and  misled  by 
prejudiced  reports  of  missionaries  and  by  the  report 
of  a  now  discredited  traitor,  of  the  testimony  of 
Casement's  successor  at  Boma.  Colonel  Thessiger 
reported  ofBcially  to  the  Foreign  Office  at  the  begin- 
ning of  1909  that  the  whole  system  of  Belgian  taxa- 
tion was  fraudulent,  and  that  the  violation  of  laws 
and  the  heart-rending  atrocities  of  the  rubber  col- 
lecting were  due  to  the  wilful  blindness,  if  not  to  the 
actual  connivance,  of  the  Belgian  officials.  During 
the  same  year,  in  October,  the  native  chiefs  sent 
a  memorandum  to  the  Belgian  Colonial  Minister, 
praying  for  relief  from  taxation.  They  could  obtain 
no  rubber,  and  received  no  return  for  the  taxes  ex- 
acted of  them.  British  prospectors  and  traders  were 
prevented  from  operating  in  the  Katanga  Province. 
The  Belgian  Socialist  leader,  Vandcrvelde,  made  a 
journey  to  the  Congo  to  defend  two  American  mis- 
sionaries, who  had  been  arrested  on  the  charge  of 
libeling  one  of  the  big  rubber  companies.  M. 
n  161 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Vandervelde  secured  their  acquittal,  and  when  he 
returned  to  Brussels,  he  gave  testimony  on  the  floor 
of  the  Chamber  of  the  arbitrary  exploitation,  tortur- 
ing and  killing  of  natives,  and  the  use  of  armed  sen- 
tries over  rubber-collecting  slaves.  All  the  Colonial 
Minister  could  answer  was  that  he  hoped  the  charges 
were  exaggerated. 

The  death  of  Leopold  II.  on  December  7,  1909, 
brought  some  ray  of  hope  that  the  people  of  Belgium 
would  have  an  awakening  of  conscience,  and  attempt 
to  do  away  with  the  wholesale  butchery  and  slavery 
in  Africa  that  brought  them  as  a  civilized  and  Chris- 
tian nation  to  shame  before  the  whole  world.  Leo- 
pold's successor,  the  present  King  Albert,  had  visited 
the  Colony  during  the  year  before  his  accession. 
Starting  at  Katanga,  which  he  reached  by  way  of 
Cape  Town  and  Rhodesia,  Prince  Albert  had  walked 
fifteen  hundred  miles  through  the  Congo  forests. 
He  was  not  allowed  to  see  what  was  going  on  in  the 
Congo,  but  he  heard  enough  during  his  journey  to 
make  him  dissatisfied  with  existing  conditions.  The 
passing  of  the  Congo's  evil  genius  Leopold  gave 
Belgium  a  chance.  But  it  is  very  interesting  to  note 
here  that  the  Roman  Catholic  hierarchy  of  Belgium, 
who  in  1 9 14  appealed  to  the  Vatican  and  the  whole 
world  against  German  cruelties  in  Belgium,  "stood 
pat"  only  five  years  before,  in  the  face  of  irrefutable 
evidence  of  the  death  and  torture  and  maiming  of 
many  times  the  number  of  innocent  women  and 
children  that  the  Germans  had  to  their  record  in 
1914.  All  parties  and  all  circles  in  Belgium,  with 
the  exception   of  the  SociaHsts,  had  supported 

162 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


King  Leopold  and  defended  the  Congo  adminis- 
tration. 

For  the  first  three  years  of  King  Albert's  reign, 
Great  Britain  still  refused  to  recognize  the  annexa- 
tion. In  1 910,  the  Congo  Reform  Association  and 
the  Aborigines  Protection  Society,  whose  agents  were 
touring  extensively,  convinced  the  Foreign  Office 
that  forced  labor  had  not  been  abolished.  In  191 1, 
consular  investigation  showed  that  conditions  were 
improved  in  many  districts,  but  that  the  Belgian 
administration  was  still  far  from  satisfactory.  There 
was  the  controversy,  also,  over  the  question  of  free- 
dom of  trade.  Sir  Edward  Grey  doubted  the  desire 
of  the  Congo  authorities  to  observe  treaty  obliga- 
tions in  this  matter.  The  revocation,  however,  of 
the  charters  of  three  of  the  largest  concession  com- 
panies at  the  beginning  of  1912  showed  that  Belgium 
was  at  last  awakening  to  the  necessity  of  abolishing 
monopolies  and  throwing  the  Congo  open  to  free 
trade. 

The  last  outstanding  question  between  Belgium 
and  the  public  opinion  of  the  world  was  that  of  native 
right  to  land  ownership.  In  this  matter,  Germany 
stood  with  Great  Britain.  Concessions  to  companies 
gave  private  individuals  rights  over  large  tracts  of 
land  which  superseded  preexisting  native  rights. 
This  was  a  violation  not  only  of  elementary  prin- 
ciples of  justice,  but  also  of  a  clearly  formulated 
stipulation  of  the  Berlin  Act.  By  what  right,  other 
than  that  of  the  possession  of  superior  brute  force,  is 
a  man's  land  taken  from  him  and  the  owner  com- 
pelled to  work  for  the  interest  of  another  by  terms  of 

163 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


a  unilateral  agreement  imposed  upon  him  without  his 
consent?  In  the  old  days,  the  natives  of  Central 
Africa  suffered  from  occasional  slave-raiding  parties, 
T/hich  would  take  a  few  hundred  at  a  time  into  cap- 
tivity. Europeans  abolished  slave-trading — in  the 
name  of  Christ  and  humanity — but  they  substituted 
a  slavery  far  more  degrading/  Not  an  occasional 
few  hundred  were  victims,  but  all  the  people  all  the 
time  were  reduced  to  slavery.  The  companies 
answered  the  charge  of  the  Aborigines  Society,  that 
native  rights  were  being  violated  in  the  leased  areas, 
by  the  statement  that  their  concessions  tended  "to 
the  uplifting  of  the  native  and  his  betterment." 
They  professed  the  most  benevolent  intentions  to- 
wards the  people  they  were  oppressing ! 

In  June,  1913,  after  ten  years  of  constant  agitation, 
the  victory  appeared  to  have  been  won.  For  Sir 
Edward  Grey  announced  in  June  that  consular  re- 
ports from  the  Congo  made  it  no  longer  justifiable 
or  expedient  to  withhold  recognition  of  the  annexa- 
tion. Arrangements  were  being  made  to  grant  free 
land  to  natives  for  cultivation,  and  Belgium  had 

'  I  say  Europeans  instead  of  Belgians,  because  this  evil  was  by  no 
means  confined  to  the  Congo.  At  this  very  time  it  was  under  investi- 
gation in  the  French,  British  and  German  West  African  colonies, 
especially  in  connection  with  the  cocoa  and  palm-oil  industries. 
Violation  of  native  land  rights  and  forced  labor  go  hand  in  hand — 
inseparably — in  almost  every  concession  in  what  is  known  as  Protec- 
torate areas.  If  you  take  the  black  man's  land  to  develop  it,  you 
must  use  him  as  the  laborer.  If  he  does  not  want  to  work  on  your 
terms,  you  make  him.  Hence  the  abuses.  It  was  on  the  ground  of 
violation  of  the  Berlin  Act  that  Germany  in  1913  protested  against 
the  extensive  concession  granted  by  Liberia  to  the  British  firm  of 
Lever,  the  soap  manufacturers. 

164 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


accomplished  much  in  improving  her  administration. 
The  personal  knowledge  and  influence  of  King  Albert, 
the  pressure  of  the  Belgian  Socialist  Party,  and  the 
increasing  revelation  of  the  richness  of  the  Congo 
basin  were  the  decisive  factors  in  the  work  of  reform. 
One  searches  in  vain  to  find,  outside  of  the  Socialist 
organization,  a  campaign  for  Congo  reform  in  Brus- 
sels and  Antwerp  during  these  ten  years.  The 
Belgians  seemed  to  have  no  sense  of  responsibility 
toward  the  Congo,  and  the  stories  of  the  atrocities 
of  which  their  officials  and  soldiers  were  guilty,  sup- 
ported though  they  were  by  incontrovertible  testi- 
mony, made  no  impression  upon  them. 

Fortunately,  unchecked  exploitation  by  concession 
companies  and  maladministration  of  officials  is  not 
the  whole  story  of  the  Congo  since  1900.  As  was 
indicated  in  the  report  of  the  Commission  of  Inquiry, 
there  is  another  and  brighter  side  of  Belgian  activity. 
In  May,  1902,  an  agreement  was  signed  in  Brussels 
for  the  extension  of  the  Cape  to  Cairo  railway  from 
the  northern  border  of  Rhodesia  to  Lake  Kasala.  It 
was  the  idea  to  have  the  Rhodesian  line,  which  was  to 
pass  through  Katanga,  join  in  this  region  a  line  from 
Benguela,  an  Atlantic  port  in  PortugueseWest  Africa. 
Rhodesia  would  then  have  a  much  shorter  connection 
with  the  sea  coast,  and  a  northern  route  would  be 
opened  up  through  the  Congo  valley  across  to  Lake 
Albert  and  up  the  Nile.  At  this  time  the  Reichstag 
had  refused  to  vote  the  credits  for  the  extension  of 
the  line  from  Dar-es-Salaam  to  Lake  Tanganika,  and 
it  was  believed  that  the  German  line  would  not  be 
built.    The  line  from  the  south  into  Katanga  Pro- 

165 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


vince  of  the  Belgian  Congo  reached,  in  1912,  Eliza- 
bethville,  only  a  few  miles  from  the  Rhodesian 
frontier,  but  over  one  hundred  and  sixty  miles  from 
the  point  in  which  it  enters  Belgian  territory.  It 
had  been  surveyed  north  to  Bukama,  and  construc- 
tion work  was  being  rapidly  pushed  in  1914. 

Progress  has  been  made  also  in  opening  up  the 
Congo  valley  south  from  Stanleyville,  where  the 
river  makes  its  sharp  bend,  through  the  heart  of 
Central  Africa,  into  Katanga.  In  September,  1906, 
the  railway  from  Stanleyville  to  Ponthierville,  a 
stretch  where  the  Congo  is  not  navigable,  was  com- 
pleted. The  Congo  from  Ponthierville  to  Kindu 
is  navigable.  From  Kindu  to  Kongolo  two  hundred 
and  twenty  miles  of  railway  have  been  built.  A 
glance  at  the  map  will  show  that  these  are  important 
sections  in  the  Cape  to  Cairo  railway.  From  Stan- 
leyville to  Lake  Albert  Edward  the  survey  was  com- 
pleted in  191 1,  and  an  agreement  reached  to  connect 
the  Katanga  railway  with  the  Portuguese  frontier, 
and  the  Congo  with  Lake  Tanganika.  The  latter 
line,  because  of  its  importance  in  the  campaign 
against  the  Germans,  was  completed  in  March,  19 15. 
There  are  also  railway  lines  from  Matadi  (near 
Boma)  to  Leopoldville, '  and  from  Boma  to  Tshela. 

'  "Leopoldville,  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  Congo  River  from 
Brazzaville,  is  less  pretty  and  picturesque;  but  one  feels  there  more 
activity,  or  an  activity  more  concentrated,  and  much  more  order 
and  method.  The  state  is  proprietor  of  almost  all  the  land,  and  of 
almost  all  the  houses,  as  well  as  of  the  camp  on  the  outskirts,  where 
is  found  grouped  the  entire  black  population.  The  Belgian  line 
from  Matadi  to  Kinchassa  is  a  narrow-gauge  railway  over  the  moun- 
tains.   It  takes  two  days  to  go  the  500  kilometers.    Its  construc- 

166 


THE  BELCxIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


As  the  Congo  from  Leopoldville  to  Stanleyville  is 
navigable,  communication  by  rail  and  steamer  is 
now  practically  complete  all  the  way  across  the 
continent,  and  from  the  heart  of  Central  Africa  south 
for  nearly  two  thousand  three  hundred  miles  to  Cape 
Town. 

Unstinted  credit  is  due  to  Belgian  engineers  and 
Belgian  officials  for  vision,  for  energy,  and  for  ability 
to  surmount  seemingly  unsurmountable  difficulties 
in  making  these  railways  possible.  There  has  always 
been,  on  the  part  of  the  Belgian  authorities,  whole- 
hearted cooperation  with  British  and  Germans  in 
opening  up  Central  Africa,  and  the  three  states  have 
worked  together,  without  too  much  thought  of  sel- 
fish advantage,  in  furthering  transportation  schemes. 
In  March,  1914,  the  Colonial  Minister,  in  a  remark- 
able speech  presenting  the  Congo  budget,  admitted 
that  the  completion,  of  the  German  line  from  Dar- 
es-Salaam to  Lake  Tanganika  was  going  to  modify 
transport  conditions  by  attracting  traffic  that  would 
otherwise  go  west  through  Belgian  territory  all  the 
way  to  the  Atlantic.  But  he  beUeved  that  there  was 
room  for  all,  and  that  the  influence  of  German  ac- 
tivity on  Belgian  railwayplans  was  much  exaggerated. 
He  thought,  on  the  other  hand,  that  Belgium  would 
ultimately  draw  advantages  from  the  increased  means 


tion  was  to  cost  five  million  dollars:  it  has  cost  thirteen  millions. 
Commenced  under  great  obstacles,  it  has  admirably  succeeded. 
Travelers  and  freight  increase  each  year;  and  the  company  is  able 
to  lessen  tariffs,  which  are  still  very  high."  M.  Felicien  Challaye, 
a  member  of  the  de  Brazza  investigating  party,  writing  in  1905. 
See  Le  Congo  Franqais  (Paris,  1909),  pp.  21-2,  28. 

167 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


of  transportation  in  all  directions.  He  submitted 
new  railway  projects  for  over  two  thousand  miles  of 
interior  lines. 

Aside  from  slight  difficulties  with  Great  ^Britain  over 
the  Bahr-el-Ghazal  and  Uganda  frontiers,  and  the 
evacuation  of  the  Lado  Enclave,  Belgium  has  worked 
in  harmony  and  in  a  friendly  spirit  with  France, 
Great  Britain,  Germany,  and  Portugal  in  the  estab- 
lishment of  frontiers.  Too  much  praise  cannot  be 
given  to  the  members  of  the  frontier  commissions 
everywhere  in  Africa  for  the  completion,  without 
friction,  of  tasks  that  are  little  appreciated  and  talked 
about,  though  arduous  and  perilous.  How  often 
have  frontier  commissions  had  to  make  their  own 
maps,  decide  on  questions  that  may  in  the  future  be 
of  tremendous  importance,  and  at  the  same  time  be 
ever  on  the  alert  to  defend  themselves  against  hostile 
savages  and  keep  in  check  jungle  and  swamp  fevers ! 

Belgium  has  a  rich  possession  in  the'  Congo,  espe- 
cially since  the  solving  of  means  of  transport  has  done 
away  with  dependence  upon  native  porters  and  has 
made  possible  the  development  of  mining.  In  the 
Katanga  region,  copper  and  tin  and  diamonds  have 
been  discovered.  In  many  valleys  of  the  Congo 
tributaries  there  is  gold.  The  palm  oil  and  palm 
nut  industries  are  developing  encouragingly.  In 
view  of  the  rapid  decrease  of  forest  produce,  this 
means  economic  salvation  for  the  Congo.  For  con- 
cession companies,  knowing  that  they  had  to  make 
hay  while  the  sun  was  shining  and  as  indifferent  to 
the  future  as  if  they  had  been  American  lumber 
companies,  deliberately  killed  the  goose  that  laid  the 

1 68 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


golden  egg.  In  1912,  forest  produce  fell  off  nearly 
ten  per  cent.,  and  in  191 3,  the  export  of  rubber  de- 
creased fifty  per  cent.  There  are  left  in  the  world  few 
virgin  territories.  It  is  a  pity  that  governments 
have  followed  the  line  of  least  resistance  in  the 
development  of  new  territories,  farming  them  out  on 
concessions,  and  have  not  waked  up  to  the  fact  that 
private  corporations  have  no  interest  in  the  common- 
weal, until  it  is  too  late  to  save  much  of  what  might 
have  been  conserved.  The  days  of  chartered  com- 
panies, with  a  free  hand  to  milk  dry  vast  regions,  are 
over.  Belgium  in  the  Congo,  like  other  European 
nations  in  their  colonial  possessions,  is  waking  up  to 
the  fact  that  the  State  alone  feels  its  responsibility 
towards  unborn  generations,  and  that  only  by  govern- 
mental restrictions,  enforced  by  capable  govern- 
mental supervision,  can  individuals  and  corporations 
be  prevented  from  sacrificing  the  future  for  im- 
mediate gain.  The  rubber  industry  in  the  Congo 
illustrates  this  principle  perfectly.  Big  dividends 
to-day,  for  to-morrow  our  leases  may  be  revoked. 
The  devil  take  the  future. 

Belgian  experiences  in  administration  and  finance 
in  the  Congo  have  not  been  very  different  from  those 
of  Germany  and  Italy  in  their  early  days  as  coloniz- 
ing states.  An  official  class,  accustomed  to  deal  with 
colonial  problems,  cannot  be  created  in  a  generation. 
Pioneers  make  many  mistakes.  Socialist  parties — 
every  Opposition  in  fact — use  colonial  blunders  and 
mismanagement,  real  or  fancied,  for  attacks  upon  the 
Government,  especially  in  connection  with  budget 
estimates.    In  Belgium  as  in  Germany  the  Socialists 

169 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


have  been  the  voice  of  conscience.  We  have  already 
mentioned  Vandervelde's  courage  in  speaking  the 
unwelcome  truth  after  his  visit  to  the  Congo.  Time 
and  again  he  and  other  Sociahsts  criticized  in  the 
Chamber  what  they  considered  unjust  decrees  of  the 
Colonial  Minister,  and  exposed  abuses.  But  the 
Socialists,  while  performing  this  useful  service,  are 
obstructionists  in  money  matters,  and  oppose  con- 
sistently "throwing  good  money  after  bad "  in  colo- 
nial enterprises.  They  oppose  also  mihtary  service 
abroad.  There  was  a  howl  when  Belgium  sent  nearly 
four  thousand  soldiers  for  Congo  duty  in  1909,  and 
the  deficit  revealed  in  the  1910  budget  added  to  the 
complication  of  the  British  attitude.  As  far  as 
revenue  goes,  things  have  not  been  improved.  Just 
before  the  war  the  revelation  of  a  deficit  of  nearly 
five  million  dollars  in  the  1914  estimates  made  diffi- 
cult getting  the  ear  of  the  Chamber  for  railway  grants. 
The  customs  yield  of  the  Belgian  Congo  is  not  much 
larger  than  that  of  Sierra  Leone,  with  one-thirtieth 
of  the  area  and  one-fifteenth  of  the  Congo  population. 

Although  reforms  have  been  sincerely  effected, 
Belgium  has  still  the  same  great  problem  of  colonial 
administration  that  France  and  Portugal  face  in 
Africa.  These  states  possess  enormous  territories, 
which  are  not  well  administered  and  developed  as 
they  might  be  because  they  have  not  the  surplus  popu- 
lation able  and  willing  to  undertake  the  task.  Before 
the  war,  the  Belgian  Congo  was  run  by  a  staff  of 
Europeans  of  many  nationalities,  some  of  them  ad- 
venturers of  the  worst  type.  Even  among  the  high 
officials,  many  were  not  Belgian.     They  were  in  the 

170 


THE  BELGIANS  IN  THE  CONGO 


Congo  only  because  they  saw  there  an  opportunity 
to  have  influence  and  to  make  money  that  was 
denied  to  them  in  their  countries  of  origin. 

Belgium  has  given  valuable  assistance  in  the  long 
two  years  campaign  against  German  East  Africa. 
I  have  understood,  on  good  authority,  that  she  has 
been  able  to  train,  equip,  officer,  and  put  into  the 
field  twenty  thousand  native  troops. 

During  the  first  year  of  the  European  War,  there 
was  much  discussion  about  the  future  of  the  Congo, 
and  it  is  certain  that  Germany  intends  to  use  her  hold 
on  Belgium,  if  she  is  able  to  maintain  it  until  negotia- 
tions for  peace  begin,  as  a  trump  card  in  the  read- 
justment of  European  spheres  in  Africa.  Should  she 
be  successful,  it  would  mean  the  realization  of  Ger- 
man dreams  of  a  path  from  east  to  west  across  the 
continent.  The  Germans  have  not  hesitated  to 
insinuate  that  the  great  sums  loaned  to  Belgium  by 
the  Allies,  especially  by  Great  Britain,  would  be 
secured  by  Anglo-French  economic,  if  not  poUtical, 
control  of  the  Congo.  In  order  to  make  clear  the 
intentions  of  the  Allies,  and  to  set  at  rest  the  minds 
of  the  Belgians  and  allay  suspicions  of  neutrals,  the 
French  Minister  handed  to  the  Belgian  Ministry  of 
Foreign  Affairs  at  Havre  on  April  29th,  191 6,  the 
following  declaration : 

"Referring  on  one  hand  to  the  agreements  with 
Belgium  of  April  23-24,  1884,  February  5,  1895,  and 
December  23,  1908,  and  on  the  other  hand  to  the 
note  handed  on  September  19,  1914,  to  the  Belgian 
Government  by  the  Minister  of  Great  Britain  on  the 
subject  of  the  Congo  as  well  as  to  the  declaration  of 

171 

I 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  Powers  guarantors  of  the  independence  and  neu- 
trahty  of  Belgium  on  February  14,  1916,  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  French  Repubhc  declares  that  it  will  lend 
its  aid  to  the  Belgian  Government  at  the  time  of  the 
peace  negotiations  with  the  view  of  maintaining  the 
Belgian  Congo  in  its  present  territorial  status  and 
of  having  attributed  to  this  colony  a  special  indem- 
nity for  the  losses  incurred  in  the  course  of  the  war. " 

On  the  same  day,  the  British  and  Russian  repre- 
sentatives at  Sainte  Adresse  stated  that  their  Govern- 
ments adhered  to  this  declaration,  and  the  Italian 
and  Japanese  representatives  that  Italy  and  Japan 
approved  the  French  note. 


172 


CHAPTER  IX 


THE  FIRST  GERMAN  COLONY:  SOUTHWEST 
AFRICA 

/^~^  ERMAN  Southwest  Africa  occupies  more  than 


a  quarter  of  the  area  of  the  continent  south 


of  the  Zambesi  River.  Its  coast  line,  running 
from  Portuguese  West  Africa  to  the  Orange  River, 
which  is  the  boundary  with  Cape  Colony,  is,  with 
the  exception  of  the  Spanish  Rio  de  Oro,  the  most 
barren  and  forbidding  littoral  of  all  Africa.  It  was 
formerly  known  as  Damaraland  in  the  north  and 
Namaqualand  in  the  south,  and  was  as  completely 
ignored  in  the  early  days  of  European  colonization 
as  Bechuanaland  and  the  Kalahari  Desert,  which 
form  its  interior  boundary.  The  British  neglected 
to  proclaim  a  protectorate  over  territories  which 
had  so  little  promise.  They  awakened  to  what  they 
had  missed  only  when  Germany  anticipated  them. 

In  1883,  an  enterprising  Bremen  merchant  ac- 
quired from  a  native  chief  the  southern  portion  of 
this  territory  from  Angra  Pequena  to  the  Orange 
River  and  called  it  Liideritzland  after  himself.  The 
following  year  Germany's  entrance  into  Africa — 
and  into  colonial  politics — was  announced  by  Bis- 
marck's telegram  to  the  German  Consul  at  Cape 
Town: 


173 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


"According  to  a  communication  from  Herr  Luder- 
itz,  the  British  Colonial  officials  doubt  whether  his 
acquisitions  north  of  the  Orange  River  can  claim 
German  protection.  You  will  declare  officially  that 
he  and  his  settlement  are  under  the  protection  of  the 
Empire." 

The  German  flag  was  rapidly  extended  north 
along  the  coast  to  Portuguese  territory  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Cunene  River,  which  is  some  distance  beyond 
Cape  Frio.  Between  1884  and  1 890  the  Germans 
penetrated  to  the  desert  of  Kalahari.  A  boundary 
was  established  with  Great  Britain  on  the  edge  of  the 
Bechuanaland  Protectorate,  and  in  1890  the  Germans 
made  good  their  claim  in  the  extreme  north  to  a 
narrow  strip  which  gave  them  access  to  the  Zambesi 
River  not  far  west  of  Victoria  Falls. 

The  occupation  of  Togoland,  Kamerun,  and 
German  East  Africa  followed  that  of  Southwest 
Africa  in  less  than  a  year. 

Many  English  writers,  and  particularly  the  few 
who  have  written  on  the  German  African  colonies 
since  August  i,  19 14,  have  described  the  German 
penetration  in  Southwest  Africa  and  elsewhere  as 
the  result  of  contemptible  trickery  and  bluff.  They 
try  to  prove  that  the  whole  history — from  the  diplo- 
matic and  political  side,  and  even  partially  from  the 
economic  side — of  Germany  in  Africa  is  a  disgraceful 
chapter  of  brutality  and  failure.  The  heat  of  conflict 
has  led  them  to  distort  facts  and  to  express  hopelessly 
biased  judgments.  It  is  unfortunate,  at  a  moment 
when  the  question  of  the  future  of  the  German 
colonies  needs  a  dispassionate  attitude,  that  sources 

174 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 


of  information  in  the  English  language  should  be  so 
one-sided. ' 

There  is  much  to  deplore  and  condemn  in  German 
methods  of  colonization  in  Africa.  But  there  is  no 
more  to  condemn  in  German  methods  than  in 
French  and  Italian,  and  not  as  much  as  in  Belgian. 
The  results  of  thirty  years  are  not  encouraging,  if 
one  compares  them  with  the  results  obtained  by 
Great  Britain  during  the  same  period.  It  must 
always  be  borne  in  mind,  however,  that  Germany, 
Italy,  and  Belgium  are  new  hands  at  colonizing.  It  is 
as  unfair  to  compare  German  colonial  administration 
with  British  colonial  administration  as  it  would  be 
to  compare  British  General  Staff  officers  with  German 
General  Staff  officers.  As  for  the  methods  by  which 
colonies  are  acquired,  Germany  has  done  nothing,  in 
bringing  territories  under  her  flag,  that  has  not  been 
done  by  every  other  colonizing  Power.  The  Euro- 
pean colonial  game  has  always  been  one  of  grab 
when  you  can  and  how  you  can,  and  the  last  word  has 
invariably  been  to  him  who  was  the  strongest.  The 

'  "  In  something  less  than  a  year  Germany  had  intrigued,  lied,  and 
tricked  Britain  into  acknowledging  her  sovereignty  over  1,000,000 
{sic)  square  miles  of  Africa,  or  an  area  about  nine  times  as  large  as 
the  whole  of  the  United  Kingdom,  with  a  total  native  population  of 
nearly  14,000,000." — A.  F.  Calvert,  German  African  Colonies  (Lon- 
don, 1916),  p.  xiii.  of  preface.  Mr.  Calvert  claims  that  all  the 
territories  were  virtually  British,  and  that  their  chiefs  had  begged  for 
the  establishment  of  a  British  Protectorate.  He  pretends  that  the 
native  population  of  the  German  colonies  welcomed  the  British 
recently  as  deliverers,  in  sharp  contrast  to  "the  Boers,  converted  by 
British  rule  to  be  its  entliusiastic  supporters,"  who  defended  South 
Africa  against  the  German  invasion. 

175 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


title  to  possession  of  the  territories  held  by  European 
states  outside  of  Europe  is  a  title  won  by  force. 

German  development  has  been  hampered  from  the 
very  first  days  by  the  British  possession  of  Wahisch 
Bay,  the  only  natural  port  along  the  coast.  The 
two  important  watercourses  that  reach  the  seaboard 
in  German  Southwest  Africa  empty  into  Walfisch 
Bay,  and  England  is  able  (as  the  events  of  1914 
proved)  to  dominate  the  coast  without  difficulty 
from  this  important  strategic  point.  The  harbor 
has  good  anchorage,  and  is  sheltered  from  the  most 
frequent  winds.  The  British  have  never  been  able 
to  make  anything  out  of  Walfisch  Bay  for  themselves. 
By  continuing  to  hold  it,  they  have  compelled  the 
Germans  to  spend  enormous  sums  of  money  in 
creating  the  port  of  Swakopmund  in  a  far  less  favor- 
able locality.  It  is  a  striking  example  of  a  dog-in-the- 
manger  policy  that  a  more  liberal  and' wiser  attitude 
towards  German  extra-European  expansion  should 
have  prompted  Great  Britain  to  abandon  long  ago. 
Walfisch  Bay  is  one  of  the  pin-pricks  that  have 
developed  in  Germany  the  spirit  which  is  now  taking 
terrible  vengeance  upon  the  world. 

Absence  of  water  from  perennial  rivers  and  a 
limited  rainfall  give  Southwest  Africa  a  soil  that 
makes  agriculture  exceedingly  difficult.  In  dry 
years  the  rivers  cannot  be  depended  upon.  Irriga- 
tion is  so  costly  that  the  prospect  of  the  colony 
becoming  agricultural  is  very  slim  indeed.  But  the 
country  is  covered  with  a  grass  that  possesses 
unusual  nourishing  properties,  and  there  is  sufficient 
water  for  cattle  in  almost  every  district.    The  only 

176 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 


way  to  utilize  the  land  to  advantage  is  by  stock- 
raising.  Dr.  Rohrbach,  who  looked  over  the  country 
for  the  German  Government  in  order  to  see  what  the 
prospects  of  systematic  settlement  were,  declared 
that  about  five  hundred  thousand  out  of  the  eight 
hundred  thousand  square  kilometers  could  be  used 
as  grazing  land.  This  means  five  thousand  good 
farms.  On  April  I,  1913,  there  were  over  twelve 
hundred  farms  in  private  hands. 

The  Government  has  done  much  to  encourage 
stock-raising  by  importing  bulls  and  cows,  by  paying 
the  cost  of  transporting  Australian  sheep,  and  by 
organizing  a  splendid  veterinary  service.  During 
the  years  immediately  before  the  war  there  was  a  re- 
markable increase  in  cattle  and  horses  and  ostriches. 

In  1913,  the  Government  inaugurated  a  Land 
Bank,  with  a  capital  of  two  and  one  half  million 
dollars,  to  lend  money  at  easy  rates  to  farmers  for  the 
purchase  of  stock  and  for  tiding  them  over  bad  years. 
The  system  is  worked  out  to  the  very  smallest  detail, 
and  shows  the  German  genius  for  finance.  Advances, 
which  are  made  up  to  fifty  per  cent.,  are  secured  on 
the  value  of  the  property.  The  arrangement  for 
looking  after  existing  mortgages  satisfies  the  creditors. 
From  the  Land  Bank  money  can  be  obtained  at  two 
per  cent,  lower  rate  than  from  other  sources. 

Dr.  Rohrbach's  hope  that  there  might  ultimately 
be  five  thousand  prosperous  stock-raising  farms  in 
the  colony — and  this  was  the  estimate  if  every 
available  acre  was  used — would  not  make  the 
tremendous  sacrifices  of  Germany,  both  of  blood  and 
treasure,  seem  worth  while,  were  it  not  for  good 
"  177 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


prospects  of  mining  exploitation.  The  country  has 
been  frequently  gone  over  by  geologists  and  pros- 
pectors. There  is  gold  at  a  number  of  places.  Rich 
gold-bearing  lodes  have  not  yet  been  discovered. 
What  ore  there  is,  is  of  the  same  low  grade  that  has 
made  mining  development  on  the  Transvaal  Rand 
possible  only  by  companies  with  large  capital. 
Copper  had  just  passed  the  experimental  stage 
before  the  war,  and  was  becoming  a  valuable  export. 
In  the  first  six  months  of  19 13,  copper  was  exported 
to  the  value  of  three-quarters  of  a  million  dollars — 
a  substantial  increase  over  the  same  period  in  1912. 
Copper  development  has  been  started  on  an  admir- 
able scientific  and  financial  basis.  Lead  and  silver 
are  found  with  copper.  Smelting  is  done  on  the 
ground.  Electric  power  is  used.  The  by-products 
are  carefully  saved.  Tin  has  been  discovered  not  far 
from  Swakopmund,  and  over  a  hundred  tons  were 
exported  in  the  first  six  months  of  1913.  If  the 
industry  grows  as  in  Nigeria,  it  ought  very  soon,  with 
the  short  railway  haul,  to  become  a  valuable  asset. 

But  by  far  the  richest  find  in  German  Southwest 
Africa  is  the  discovery  of  diamond  fields.  Herr 
Luderitz  went  to  Angra  Pequena  in  the  first  place  for 
minerals  and  with  no  thought  of  agricultural  develop- 
ment. The  gold  and  diamond  discoveries  in  British 
South  Africa  led  him  to  hope  for  a  rich  reward. 
Neither  gold  nor  diamonds  came  to  him,  or  to  those 
who  followed  him.  The  fortunate  man  was  the 
German  railway  superintendent  of  the  Luderitz- 
Auas  railway.  He  believed  that  there  were  diamonds 
in  the  neighborhood  of  Luderitz  Bay,  and  kept 

178 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 

talking  about  it  until  people  thought  he  was  crazy. 
He  instructed  his  employees  to  have  their  eyes  open 
while  they  were  digging  the  railway  bed,  and  to 
bring  him  curious  stones  which  they  did  not  know. 
In  April,  1908,  his  hopes  were  rewarded.  A  native 
brought  in  several  diamonds.  The  exploitation 
began  immediately.  Within  eighteen  months  the 
whole  of  the  coast  line  to  the  Orange  River  had  been 
prospected.  Companies  were  formed  and  another 
railway  was  built.  In  five  years  the  diamond  industry 
became  the  most  important  in  the  colony,  and  a 
source  of  revenue  that  was  a  godsend  to  the  adminis- 
tration. The  diamonds  are  small,  but  of  exception- 
ally good  quality,  and  a  good  half  of  them  clear 
white. 

A  railway  was  constructed  from  Kolamanskop  to 
Bogenfels  through  the  diamond  country  in  1913. 
Most  of  the  mines  and  settlements  are  lighted  with 
electricity  from  Liideritzbucht.  Nowhere  in  Africa 
are  mining  enterprises  and  railways  equipped  and 
running  as  well  as  in  the  German  colonies. 

The  Government  originally  took  a  royalty  on 
diamonds.  It  was  changed  in  1912  to  a  tax  on  profits 
amounting  to  about  forty  per  cent.  The  change 
shows  the  acumen  of  a  Government  in  which  brains 
is  the  essential  factor.  Under  the  old  royalty  system 
the  miners  picked  up  the  stones  that  were  easiest  to 
obtain.  For  the  royalty  made  no  distinction  between 
the  stone  found  by  hazard  and  that  which  cost  a  lot 
of  money  to  unearth.  Taxation  on  profits  encourages 
the  mining  companies  to  develop  consistently  all 
their  fields.    The  Germans  saw  that  if  the  industry 

179 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


was  to  become  a  permanent  source  of  wealth  to 
the  Government,  it  was  imperative  to  discard  the 
royalty  system. 

The  profit  that  the  Germans  derive  from  the 
diamond  industry  is  shown  by  the  development  in 
six  years  from  less  than  forty  thousand  carats  to 
nearly  one  million  six  hundred  thousand  carats.  One 
mine  alone  produced  over  six  hundred  thousand 
carats  in  19 13.  The  German  output  during  1912 
increased  over  the  figures  of  the  previous  year,  in 
proportion  to  the  total  output,  twice  as  much  as  that 
of  the  South  African  Commonwealth. 

Until  1892,  when  the  German  people  first  began 
to  beHeve  in  colonies,  Southwest  Africa  was  ex- 
ploited by  companies,  who  held  concessions  and  were 
partly  subsidized  by  the  Government.  There  were 
less  than  fifty  soldiers  in  the  colony,  and  the  natives 
had  no  conception  of  a  powerful  German  Empire. 
Government  officials  were  very  few,  and  were  at  the 
beck  and  call  of  the  companies.  The  hinterland  was 
not  under  administrative  control,  and  absence  of 
ports  made  coast  communications  difficult.  Colonial 
history  begins  only  with  the  twentieth  century,  when 
the  British  aggression  against  the  Boer  republics 
awakened  interest  in  Germany.  The  Germans 
realized  that  they  must  develop  the  territories  they 
held — or  quit  the  game  altogether.  Over  two  million 
dollars  was  granted  to  Southwest  Africa  in  1901, 
and  arrangements  made  to  begin  railway  construc- 
tion into  Damaraland  northwest  from  Swakopmund. 
The  line  was  to  have  its  terminus  at  Otavi,  four 
hundred  miles  from  Walfisch  Bay.    Another  line, 

180 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 


already  started  directly  inland  from  Swakopmund, 
was  completed  in  1902  as  far  as  Windhoek,  which  is 
almost  exactly  in  the  center  of  the  colony. 

At  this  moment  began  the  conflict  in  the  Reichstag 
between  the  Radicals  and  the  Imperialists,  which 
extended  over  five  years,  and  which  must  he  taken  into 
account  constantly  in  a  study  of  German  colonial 
expansion.  It  was  not  until  1907,  when  the  Colonial 
Office  was  established,  after  the  question  of  colonial 
expansion  had  been  referred  to  the  electorate,  that 
Germany  can  be  said  to  have  entered  with  a  free 
hand  and  with  parliamentary  and  popular  support 
into  the  work  of  colonizing.  When  one  criticizes 
German  colonial  administration,  and  tries  to  estimate 
the  ability  of  the  Germans  to  develop  colonies,  it  is 
not  fair  to  begin  before  1907.  The  German  nation 
and  the  German  Government  must  be  judged  only 
by  what  has  been  accomplished  since  that  date. 

When  the  Government  proposed  to  the  Reichstag 
in  1902  to  subsidize  the  immigration  bureau  estab- 
lished by  the  Colonial  Society,  the  proposal  was 
rejected.  The  Reichstag  majority  was  unwilling  to 
use  state  funds  to  encourage  immigration  to  colonies 
that  were  unsuitable  for  European  settlers.  The 
argument  of  Germans  abroad  living  under  the  German 
flag  did  not  appeal  at  all.  It  was  urged  on  the  floor 
of  the  Reichstag  that  if  emigrants  were  to  be 
assisted,  they  ought  to  be  directed  to  South  America, 
and  especially  to  southern  Brazil.  The  subsidy 
proposal  was  made  the  occasion  for  a  bitter  attack 
upon  the  acquisition  of  the  Spanish  islands  in  the 
Pacific.    There  were  less  than  three  thousand  five 

181 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


hundred  Europeans  in  the  Protectorate  in  1902, 
spread  over  a  territory  one  and  one-half  times  as 
large  as  the  German  Empire,  and  more  than  a 
thousand  of  these  were  not  Germans.  A  serious 
question  arose  as  to  the  future  from  the  entry  of  a 
great  many  Boers  who  had  trekked  once  more  to 
escape  the  extension  of  British  rule.  Severe  measures 
had  to  be  taken  to  prevent  the  country  from  being 
overrun  by  Boer  irreconcilables.  If  they  were 
allowed  to  come  in  large  numbers,  they  would  un- 
doubtedly soon  be  at  loggerheads  with  the  Germans 
and  other  Europeans,  ^ 

When  the  future  of  the  German  colonies  was  being 
seriously  compromised,  their  existence,  in  fact,  im- 
periled, by  the  radical  attitude  in  Germany,  an  event 
happened  in  Southwest  Africa  that  has  changed  the 
course  of  history.  A  revolt  of  Hottentots  at  Warm- 
bad  in  December,  1903,  resulted  in  the  death  of  a 

'  Capital  has  since  been  made  of  ttie  inhospitality  of  the  German 
Government  to  the  trekkers  of  1902.  I  have  looked  into  this  question 
very  carefully,  and  cannot  see  where  the  Germans  acted  in  any  other 
way  than  it  was  imperative  for  them  at  the  moment  to  act.  The 
Boers  quickly  outnumbered  in  some  districts  the  German  settlers. 
The  very  fact  that  they  trekked  was  a  proof  that  they  were  either  an 
unsuccessful  element  at  home,  who  had  nothing  to  lose,  or  intractable 
to  an  extreme  degree.  The  pastors  with  them  immediately  demanded 
a  promise  of  education  in  the  Taal  language  under  much  more  hberal 
provisions  than  the  Boers  have  obtained  in  South  Africa.  Many  of 
them,  demoralized  perhaps  by  three  years  of  undisciplined  warfare 
in  commandos,  wandered  about  the  country,  killing  game,  cutting 
timber  at  will  and  wastefully,  and  pasturing  their  flocks  over  wide 
areas.  Many  wells  were  destroyed.  What  Germany  insisted  upon 
was  only  that  the  Boers  should  submit  to  the  laws  and  regulations 
governing  German  settlers  in  the  colony;  and  the  same  terms  of  land 
settlement  were  proposed  to  them  as  to  colonists  from  Europe. 

182 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 


German  officer  and  several  non-commissioned  officers 
and  soldiers.  During  another  native  rising  some 
settlers  were  massacred.  In  January,  1904,  the 
Hereros  began  to  murder  settlers  and  destroy  railway 
bridges  and  telegraph  lines.  In  October  the  Witbois 
revolted.  These  events  were  due  to  the  inevitable 
clash  that  comes  in  Africa  when  Europeans  penetrate 
into  the  interior  with  their  railways  and  their  ideas 
of  taxation  and  administrative  control.  Every 
nation  that  has  attempted  to  colonize  the  interior  of 
Africa  has  met  with  the  same  opposition.  The 
wrongful  treatment  of  natives  by  colonists  and 
mining  companies,  who  had  obtained  land  by  fraud 
and  extortion  and  who  were  attempting  to  make  the 
ousted  natives  work  for  the  benefit  of  those  who  had 
ousted  them,  was  frankly  admitted  in  Berlin.  This 
also  has  happened  everywhere  in  Africa,  when  a 
government  has  parted  with  large  areas  of  land  on 
concession,  and  has  not  simultaneously  organized 
an  official  supervision  to  protect  native  rights. 

The  mistake  of  the  Germans  was  in  the  way  they 
tried  to  put  down  the  uprising.  Experience  in 
colonial  administration,  and  the  presence  in  the  colony 
of  skilled  administrators,  might  have  saved  all  the 
trouble  that  followed.  It  was  decided  to  send  out 
German  troops,  under  the  command  of  a  general 
who  knew  nothing  whatever  about  native  fighting 
and  native  psychology.  The  German  military  system 
is  presided  over  by  an  officer  caste,  whose  arrogance 
robs  it  of  tact  and  whose  methods  are  abhorrent. 

We  have  not  space  to  go  into  the  long  and  sad 
story  of  the  war  that  lasted  until  the  summer  of  1907. 

183 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Instead  of  trying  to  conciliate  the  natives  and 
organize  the  country  administratively  through  the 
tribal  chiefs,  as  Sir  Frederick  Lugard  did  so  admir- 
ably in  Nigeria  during  the  same  period,  Lieutenant- 
General  Trotha  tried  to  "stamp  out"  the  rebellion 
by  frightfulness.  He  set  a  price  on  the  heads  of 
insurgent  chiefs,  and  issued  a  proclamation  menacing 
the  natives  with  extermination  if  the  insiurection 
continued.  When  this  became  known  in  Germany, 
a  storm  of  indignation  swept  over  the  coimtry,  and 
Chancellor  von  Biilow  was  compelled  to  declare  null 
and  void  the  disgraceful  proclamation.  Von  Trotha 
criticized  the  Chancellor's  "weakness,"  and  attri- 
buted the  continued  opposition  of  the  Hereros  to  the 
repeal  of  his  proclamation.  He  was  removed  from 
his  command.'  But  the  mischief  was  done.  It  had 
now  become  a  Hfe  and  death  struggle. 

More  troops  and  more  money  were  reqtiired  as  the 
result  of  von  Trotha's  stupendous  folly.  Germany 
now  felt  that  the  war  against  Hereros  and  Hotten- 
tots had  to  be  seen  through  to  the  bitter  end.  This 
feeling  was  shared  by  all  the  Powers.  For  white 
supremacy  throughout  Africa  was  compromised. 
When  von  Trotha's  successor  passed  through 
Johannisberg,    Lord   Selbome,   the   British  High 

'  The  German  people  felt  that  the  honor  of  Germany  had  been 
compromised  by  von  Trotha's  conduct,  but  not  so  the  military  caste, 
of  whom  Emperor  Wilhelm  is  the  high  priest.  After  von  Trotha's 
return  to  Germany,  the  Kaiser  awarded  him  the  decoration  "Pour 
le  Me  rile."  It  is  this  contemptuous  disregard  of  public  opinion  and 
the  dictates  of  humanity,  tolerated  by  tJie  nation  which  does  not  and 
cannot  approve  it,  that  has  alienated  from  Germany  the  sympathies  of 
the  world  in  the  present  war. 

184 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 


Commissioner  for  South  Africa,  at  a  public  banquet 
wished  him  success,  and  spoke  in  emphatic  terms  of 
the  community  of  interests  between  German  and 
Britisli  in  South  Africa.  Many  Boers  enUsted  with 
the  Germans,  and  the  Cape  Colony  forces  rendered 
valuable  assistance  by  killing  and  capturing  the 
natives  who  were  forced  to  cross  the  border.  When 
the  war  ended  and  peace  was  once  more  established, 
nearly  twenty-five  hundred  Germans  had  been  killed 
and  half  the  Herero  nation  was  dead.  The  Germans 
had  to  undertake  a  complete  disarmament  of  the 
natives.  There  were  sixteen  thousand  recalcitrant 
prisoners  of  war  on  their  hands,  each  one  a  Toussaint 
Louverture,  who  knew  many  German  Leclercs. 

The  war  in  Southwest  Africa,  unjustified  in  its 
origin  and  barbarous  in  the  way  it  was  conducted,  has 
played,  like  the  Boer  War  for  Great  Britain,  an 
important  part  in  colonial  history,  and  marked  the 
beginning  of  a  new  era  in  the  history  of  Germany. 
Like  the  Boer  War  again,  good  came  from  evil.  For 
it  put  the  issue  squarely  before  the  Germans  as  to 
whether  they  intended  to  become  a  colonizing  Power 
or  not.  It  revealed  to  them  the  deficiencies  and 
weakness  of  their  administration  up  to  that  time, 
and  the  necessity  of  assuming  heavy  burdens  if  they 
were  to  build  up  an  overseas  empire.  The  year  1907, 
that  saw  the  end  of  the  rebellion,  was  the  year  of 
crisis  with  the  Germans.  The  decision  was  in  favor 
of  colonization.  Germany,  freed  of  handicaps  at 
home,  was  making  rapid  progress  when  the  European 
conflagration  of  1914  caused  the  temporary,  if  not 
permanent,  disappearance  of  her  colonial  empire. 

185 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


German  Southwest  Africa  was  radically  trans- 
formed, root  and  branch,  by  the  three  and  a  half 
years  of  war.  Administrative  control,  imder  civilian 
officers,  superseded  the  old  regime  of  private  con- 
cessions and  military  posts.  Railways  that  would 
have  taken  long  to  build  (or  might  not  have  been 
constructed  at  all,  because  of  lack  of  economic  justi- 
fication for  putting  up  the  funds),  were  built  for 
military  purposes,  and  left  as  a  precious  heritage  to 
the  colony.  The  advertisement  from  the  struggle 
brought  colonists  who  would  not  othervvdse  have  been 
attracted.  Then,  suddenly,  just  when  colonists  and 
money  were  needed  for  consolidating  the  new  era  of 
peace,  the  discovery  of  diamonds  was  the  deus  ex 
machina. 

In  1909,  German  colonists  increased  three  hundred 
per  cent.,  and  the  Government  began  to  work  hand 
in  hand  with  the  settlers  to  develop  in  every  possible 
way  the  agricultural  and  mining  resources  of  the 
colony.  There  were  ten  thousand  Germans,  exclu- 
sive of  the  army,  in  the  colony  in  1914. 

At  the  outbreak  of  the  war  one  thousand  four 
hundred  miles  of  railway,  twenty-five  hundred  miles 
of  telegraph  line,  and  over  four  hundred  miles  of 
telephone  line  were  the  achievement  of  a  decade. 
A  cable  touched  at  Swakopmund.  The  wdreless 
stations — as  the  Allies  found — were  the  last  word  in 
efficiency.  The  state  had  taken  over  the  ownership 
of  mines  and  railways,  and  farmed  them  out  on 
leases.  In  the  north  the  railway  from  Swakopmund 
to  Otavi  was  extended  in  two  branches  to  Tsumbel 
and  Grootfontein.    The  southern  railway  formed  a 

186 


GERMAN  SOUTHWEST  AFRICA 


semicircle  in  the  interior,  with  its  termini  at  Swakop- 
mund  and  Angra  Pequena.  A  branch  of  this  Hne 
south  through  the  Hottentot  country  had  nearly 
reached  the  Orange  River. 

A  crisis  arose  in  1910,  the  solution  of  which 
demonstrates  the  wisdom  and  foresight  with  which 
Germany  has  been  treating  colonial  problems  in 
recent  years,  Herr  Ertzberger  proposed  to  the 
Reichstag  that  the  expenses  of  the  Herero  war  be 
met  by  an  extraordinary  tax  on  the  property  of 
the  colonists.  Dr.  Demberg,  Colonial  Secretary, 
promptly  replied  that  the  military  operations  had 
been  the  fulfillment  of  the  Empire's  duty  to  protect 
people  and  property  under  the  German  flag,  and 
that  the  charges,  or  the  greater  part  of  them,  should 
fall  upon  the  Empire.  He  showed  that  three-fourths 
of  the  inhabitants  of  the  colony  had  gone  out  since 
the  Herero  campaign.  Such  a  tax  would  not  only  be 
unfair  to  them,  but  would  kill  the  interest  that  was 
just  beginning  to  be  taken  in  colonial  settlement. 
After  three  days  of  debate,  the  Chancellor  was  asked 
to  initiate  legislation  for  the  relief  of  the  Imperial 
Treasury  by  taxing  the  settlers  and  companies  who 
lived  in  the  colony  before  the  outbreak  of  the  upris- 
ing. In  March,  191 1,  the  Colonial  Office  pubHshed  a 
statement,  containing  a  review  of  British  colonial 
policy  from  1767  to  1906,  to  prove  that  the  taxation 
of  possessions  abroad  was  unwise,  until  the  financial 
and  economic  position  of  the  colonics  made  taxation 
justifiable  and  tolerable.  As  far  as  possible,  the 
Empire  should  seek  its  compensation  for  the  sums 
expended  by  the  colonial  budget  in  the  development 

187 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


of  commerce  with  the  colonies.  Local  colonial  taxa- 
tion should  be  determined  by  the  colonists  themselves 
and  its  proceeds  used  in  the  colonies. 

German  Southwest  Africa  was  conquered  in  19 15 
by  the  South  African  Commonwealth  Army,  and  is 
under  the  British  flag.  Its  future  is  being  decided 
now  on  the  battlefields  of  Europe,  where  British 
South  Africans  are  fighting  in  the  British  Army  to 
make  the  conquest  permanent. 


188 


CHAPTER  X 


THE   HERITAGE   OF   LIVINGSTONE  AND 
RHODES 

NYASALAND  and  Rhodesia  are  names  written 
on  the  map  of  Africa  by  the  sacrifice  and  the 
vision,  the  will  and  the  courage,  the  devotion 
and  the  endurance  of  two  men.  The  missionary, 
Livingstone,  was  thinking  about  the  Kingdom  of  God, 
and  the  business  man,  Rhodes,  was  thinking  about 
the  Kingdom  of  Great  Britain.  But  the  former  was 
not  unmoved  by  worldly  considerations :  nor  was  the 
latter  unmoved  by  philanthropic  considerations. 
Livingstone  cared  very  little  about  money  and  world 
fame:  Rhodes  cared  a  great  deal  about  both.  But 
missionary  and  promoter  were  at  one  in  the  desire  to 
bring  the  blessings  and  not  the  curses  of  civilization 
to  the  natives  of  Central  Africa,  and  in  the  belief 
that  this  could  be  accomplished  better  under  the 
aegis  of  Great  Britain  than  of  any  other  Power. 
Obstacles,  such  as  lack  of  maps  and  of  knowledge 
of  the  interior,  were  nothing  to  the  missionary  who 
had  devoted  his  life  to  blazing  a  path  for  the  Cross. 
He  was  undaunted  in  the  face  of  the  hostility  of 
tribes  who  knew  not  the  white  man  and  this  white 

189 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


man's  mission,  wild  animals,  fevers,  and — by  far 
the  worst  of  all — solitude.  Obstacles,  such  as  the  pres- 
ence of  the  Boers  on  the  road  to  the  north,  the 
territorial  appetite  of  other  Powers  than  Britain,  the 
skepticism  of  those  from  whom  the  money  had  to  be 
obtained,  and  the  engineering  difficulties  of  rivers, 
mountains,  jungle,  and  swamp,  were  nothing  to  the 
promoter  who  had  devoted  his  life  to  advancing  the 
British  flag  by  means  of  a  railway  from  one  end  to 
the  other  of  Africa.  Both  Livingstone  and  Rhodes 
were  doers  as  well  as  dreamers.  They  were  pioneers 
in  fact  and  not  in  fancy.  But,  as  we  look  back  upon 
their  life  work,  we  see  that  their  ability  to  fire  the 
imagination  of  their  fellow  countrymen  and  to 
inspire  others  to  join  in  the  work  they  were  doing 
has  meant  far  more  to  South  and  Central  Africa 
than  their  actual  achievements. 

The  name  of  Livingstone  is  connected  with  Central 
Africa  from  the  Zambesi  to  the  Congo.  But  his 
great  work  was  in  the  valleys  of  the  Zambesi  and 
Loangwa  and  Shire  and  in  the  region  west  of  Lake 
Nyasa.  Nyasaland,  where  he  was  buried,  is  his 
particular  country.  Livingstonia,  at  the  southern 
end  of  Lake  Nyasa,  perpetuates  the  missionary's 
name,  and  Blantyre,  in  the  Shire  Highlands,  his 
birthplace.  The  name  of  Livingstone  has  also  been 
given  to  the  town  on  the  Zambesi,  where  the  Cape 
to  Cairo  Railway  crosses  the  great  river,  just  east  of 
Victoria  Falls. 

The  name  of  Rhodes  is  borne  by  British  territory 
in  South-Central  Africa  north  and  south  of  the 
Zambesi  River.    Mashonaland  and  Matabeleland 

190 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


are  Southern  Rhodesia;  Marotseland  is  Northern 
Rhodesia;  and  the  valleys  of  the  Loang^'a  and 
Chambeze  Rivers,  and  the  little  angle  between  the 
southern  end  of  Lake  Tanganyika,  with  the  eastern 
side  of  Lake  Mweru  and  the  western  and  north- 
em  sides  of  Lake  Bangweulu,  are  Northeastern 
Rhodesia. 

The  Nyasaland  Protectorate  is  a  narrow  strip  of 
territory  running  north  and  south.  The  northern 
portion  touches  German  East  Africa  on  the  north  and 
shuts  off  Rhodesia  from  Lake  Nyasa  the  whole  length 
of  the  lake.  The  southern  half,  south  of  the  lake,  is 
an  enclave  in  Portuguese  East  Africa,  extending 
along  the  valley  of  the  Shire  River  almost  to  the 
point  where  the  Shire  empties  into  the  Zambesi  on 
its  lowest  navigable  reach. 

The  Zambesi,  from  German  to  Portuguese  terri- 
tory, forms  the  division  between  Northern  and 
Southern  Rhodesia.  Northeastern  Rhodesia  is 
almost  separated  from  the  other  portions  by  pro- 
jections of  Belgian  and  Portuguese  territory,  which 
make  Rhodesia  as  a  whole  look  like  an  hourglass. 
Both  east  and  west  Rhodesia  has  Germany  and 
Portugal  for  neighbors.  Belgian  Congo  is  on  the 
north  and  the  Transvaal  and  the  desert  on  the  south. 
German  Southwest  Africa  penetrates  in  a  narrow 
strip  of  land  up  to  the  Zambesi  River,  not  far  west 
of  Victoria  Falls  and  Livingstone,  through  which  the 
Cape  to  Cairo  Railway  passes.' 

After  the  present  war  there  will  be  readjustment 
of  frontiers,  especially  if  the  Allies  are  able  to  impose 

»  This  was  seized  by  Rhodesia  in  the  early  months  of  191 5. 

191 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


their  will  upon  Germany  and  if  they  do  not  intend 
to  keep  the  faith  with  Portugal.  But  the  frontiers 
of  1 9 14  will  always  be  a  valuable  historical  record 
of  how  explorers  and  colonists  and  Government 
officials,  with  no  knowledge  of  topography  farther 
than  their  eyes  could  see,  followed  river  valleys,  and 
planted  the  flag  of  their  countries  wherever  they 
happened  to  penetrate  the  unknown  interior  of 
Africa.  Their  controling  idea  was  to  keep  clear  the 
path  back  to  the  coast  from  which  they  had  come. 

Nyasaland  has  only  eight  hundred  Europeans 
and  four  hundred  Asiatics  among  a  native  population 
of  a  million  spread  over  forty  thousand  square  miles. 
It  cannot  be  said,  except  in  the  Shire  Highlands  in 
the  extreme  southern  part  of  the  protectorate  around 
Blantyre,  that  Nyasaland  is  colonized  at  all.  It  is 
like  Uganda  and  the  Sudan  and  all  the  West  African 
colonies — a  country  where  the  white  man  rules  and 
trades,  but  where  he  does  not  settle.  Strenuous 
attempts,  since  communications  by  railway  and 
river  with  the  Portuguese  coast  were  projected  and 
started,  have  been  made  to  encourage  European 
colonization.  But  from  1906  to  1 914  the  European 
population  increased  by  only  two  hundred.  Dysen- 
tery and  malaria  have  proved  too  much  for  the 
whites. 

In  1909,  the  Government  of  the  Protectorate 
prohibited  the  recruiting  of  blacks  for  work  beyond 
the  confines  of  Nyasaland.  This  measure  caused 
some  irritation  and  denunciation  in  Rhodesia.  But 
it  was  principally  directed  against  the  Transvaal, 
and  was  enacted  for  purely  humanitarian  reasons. 

192 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


It  is  interesting  to  note  here  that  this  measure  made 
it  impossible  for  the  British  Government  to  help  the 
Transvaal  in  the  negotiations  with  Portugal  regarding 
the  amount  of  traffic  demanded  by  the  Lorenzo 
Marques  Railway  at  the  expense  of  Natal  and  Cape 
Colony.  For  if  Portugal  had  threatened  to  prohibit 
the  yearly  exodus  of  laborers  from  her  East  African 
colony,  the  British  could  have  said  nothing  at  all.^ 
The  two  matters  of  general  interest  in  Nyasaland 
since  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century  are 
native  antagonism  and  the  spread  of  Mohamme- 
danism. 

In  1908,  a  native  prophetess  by  preaching  that 
the  Europeans  would  leave  the  country,  and  that  it 
was  a  sin  to  pay  the  hut  tax  to  the  white  men, 
obtained  a  great  following.  The  tax  fell  off,  and 
there  was  much  trouble  and  ill-feeUng  in  getting  the 
natives  of  districts  along  the  Portuguese  frontier 
back  to  the  habit  of  paying  this  tribute  to  the  white 
man.  It  was  beUeved  that  black  fanaticism  was  on 
the  wane.  This  was  a  grievous  mistake.  A  religious 
organization,  known  as  the  "Ethiopian  Church," 
with  which  it  was  impossible  to  find  cause  to  interfere, 
spread  in  Southern  Nyasaland,  in  the  Shire  High- 
lands, where  the  blacks  came  into  contact  with  the 
whites.  The  doctrine  of  the  "  Church  "  is  that  Africa 
belongs  to  the  black  man,  and  that  the  white  man  is 
an  intruder,  who  ought  to  be  killed  off  until  he  is  dis- 
couraged from  coming  to  take  the  black  man's  lands 
and  oppress  him.  In  1915,  a  very  serious  uprising, 
which  had  no  connection  whatever  with  the  European 

'  See  pp.  78-82  above. 

13  193 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


War,  took  place  at  the  beginning  of  the  year.  On  an 
estate  at  Magomara,  the  manager  was  beheaded  and 
other  white  men  killed.  The  heads  were  taken  to 
the  church  for  a  Thanksgiving  service.  Simultane- 
ously an  attack  was  made  upon  Blantyre,  where 
arms  and  ammunition  were  captured.  The  rebellion 
miscarried,  owing  to  a  lack  of  coordination  among 
the  ringleaders.  After  two  weeks,  the  police  had 
dispersed  all  the  bands  in  arms.  It  was  found  out  in 
the  investigation  that  the  natives  of  Shire  Highlands 
were  more  or  less  all  in  sympathy  with  this  move- 
ment, the  purpose  of  which  was  to  exterminate  the 
white  men  in  Nyasaland  and  to  carry  off  their 
women.  It  is  easy  enough  for  a  thousand  armed 
men  to  keep  in  respect  a  hundred  thousand  natives. 
But  one  wonders  whether  colonization  is  worth 
while  in  a  country  where  there  are  many  more  sol- 
diers and  police  and  officials  than  there  are  colonists, 
and  where  security  is  assured  only  as  the  result  of 
eternal  vigilance. 

Some  ten  years  ago  it  was  reported  that  a  bastard 
form  of  Mohammedanism  was  pervading  the  masses 
in  Nyasaland.  Its  growth  had  been  remarkable 
since  1903.  All  the  villages  along  the  Shire  had  huts 
set  aside  for  mosques.  By  1910,  from  Lake  Nyasa  to 
the  coast  in  Portuguese  and  German  territory,  and 
all  around  the  lake  shore  and  in  the  southern  district 
of  Nyasaland,  a  Moslem  teacher  was  to  be  found  in 
every  village.  When  the  Protectorate  was  formed 
in  1891,  Mohammedanism  was  non-existent.  The 
propaganda  had  been  carried  on  by  Zanzibar  Arabs. 
Although  it  is  frankly  opposed  to  European  influence, 

194 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


British  officials  have  not  felt  it  incumbent  to  oppose 
the  propaganda.  The  Nyasaland  natives  do  not 
make  fanatical  Moslems,  and  it  is  believed  that  the 
movement  will  not  spread  south  of  the  Zambesi. 
Christian  missionaries  are  making  strenuous  efforts 
to  combat  IVIohammedanism,  and  are,  as  in  Uganda, 
meeting  with  considerable  success  because  of  the 
great  desire  of  the  natives  to  learn  to  read  and  write. 
In  the  country  where  David  Livingstone  died,  and 
where  an  obelisk  now  marks  the  tree  that  bore  his 
heart,  miHtant  Islam  and  militant  Christianity  have 
met  to  fight  for  the  allegiance  of  the  people  whom 
Livingstone  loved. 

The  development  of  Rhodesia  began  only  a  quarter 
of  a  century  ago,  when  the  South  African  Company, 
under  the  management  of  Cecil  Rhodes,  was  granted 
a  charter  for  the  exploitation  of  territories  whose 
limits  were  vaguely  defined.  As  settlers  entered  the 
country,  and  the  necessity  was  imposed  upon  the 
British  Government  of  organizing  Rhodesia  adminis- 
tratively, the  south  and  north  and  northeastern 
parts  were  separated  politically,  and  have  undergone 
several  changes  in  the  last  two  decades.'  But  all  of 
Rhodesia  has  remained  under  the  economic  control 
of  the  South  African  Company,  whose  charter  was 
granted  for  twenty-five  years. 

Cape  Colony  took  in  the  whole  southern  tip  of 
Africa,  south  of  the  Orange  River,  which  traverses 
almost  completely  the  continent  from  west  to  east. 
There  were  to  the  north,  on  the  Atlantic  coast, 

'  Distinct  administrative  districts  have  been  called  Western  and 
Northwestern  Rhodesia. 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


German  Southwest  Africa,  and,  on  the  Indian 
Ocean  coast,  the  British  colony  of  Natal.  Directly- 
north  of  Cape  Colony,  Bechuanaland  and  an  un- 
claimed and  undesired  hinterland  lay  between  Cape 
Colony  and  the  interior  of  the  continent  that  Cecil 
Rhodes  was  developing.  It  was  largely  the  Kalahari 
Desert.  The  hostile  Orange  Free  State,  north  of 
Cape  Colony  and  west  of  Natal,  barred  the  way 
from  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  to  Rhodesia,  and  north 
of  the  Orange  Free  State  lay  the  Transvaal,  a  country 
founded  and  developed  by  Boers  who  had  trekked 
to  escape  British  rule.  These  independent  states 
were  strong  in  fighting  power,  as  the  British  had  long 
ago  discovered,  and  their  conquest  was  not  worth 
while  until  diamonds  brought  the  British  to  the 
western  frontier  of  the  Orange  Free  State  and  gold 
made  the  Transvaal  a  prize  that  would  return  interest 
on  enormous  sums  of  money.  Before  the  develop- 
ment of  the  Rand,  a  Jameson  raid  would  have  been 
regarded  as  the  mad  and  criminal  folly  of  outlaws. 
With  the  Transvaal  stamps  turning  out  gold,  it  was 
a  wise  and  patriotic  enterprise  of  pioneers. 

The  Cape  to  Cairo  Railway  did  not  need  to  pass 
through  the  territory  of  either  of  the  Dutch  republics. 
It  has  not,  in  fact,  done  so.  The  line  runs  through 
the  Kimberly  diamond  field,  skirts  the  western 
frontiers  of  the  Orange  Free  State  and  the  Transvaal 
without  entering  either,  and  strikes  north  across  the 
Khama  Country  to  Bulawayo  in  Matabeleland. 
But  it  would  not  have  been  safe  with  two  hostile 
states  so  near  to  it,  and  Transvaal  trade  and  money 
were  needed  to  make  it,  in  conjunction  with  the  lines 

196 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


running  south,  a  good  investment.  The  Boer  War 
was  essential  to  bring  to  fruition  the  dream  of  Cecil 
Rhodes  to  foimd  an  Anglo-Saxon  state  in  South 
Africa.  His  last  years  were  spent  in  the  uncertainty 
and  agony  of  the  conflict  which  he  had  indirectly 
precipitated.  He  died  the  very  week  that  the  Boers 
gave  up  the  struggle.^ 

Between  the  Commonwealth  of  South  Africa  and 
the  British  possessions  that  are  now  united  under 
the  name  of  Rhodes,  are  the  Kalahari  Desert, 
Khama's  Coimtry,  and  the  land  of  the  Bamangwatos. 
The  heart  of  southern  Africa  is  a  protectorate  called 
Bechuanaland.  The  native  chiefs  have  a  large 
amount  of  freedom,  and  are  under  the  direct  author- 
ity of  the  British  Crown.  They  pay  for  each  hut 
five  dollars  per  year  to  the  British  Commissioner, 
who  resides  at  IVIafeking  in  the  Commonwealth. 
The  Protectorate  is  in  the  South  African  customs 
union,  and,  when  Rhodesia  is  ready  to  enter,  will 
become  an  integral  part  of  the  Commonwealth. 

Rhodesia  touches  the  Transvaal  border  on  the 
Limpopo  River,  ^  near  22°  S.,  and  extends  to  the 

'  Naturally  there  is  a  division  of  opinion  in  South  Africa  in  regard 
to  Rhodes.  Wliile  the  British  look  upon  him  as  the  greatest  states- 
man produced  among  African  colonials,  to  the  Boors  he  is  the  enemy 
of  their  race,  and  the  unscrupulous  financier  whose  only  object  was 
to  exploit  their  country  for  his  own  benefit.  Fifteen  years  after  his 
death,  their  implacable  hatred  is  still  shown  in  the  opposition  to  the 
scheme  of  having  the  national  university  placed  at  his  Table  Moun- 
tain residence  near  Cape  Town. 

•Who  docs  not  remember  "the  great  grey  green  greasy  Limpopo 
River,  all  set  about  with  fever  trees,"  upon  whose  bank  the  Elephant's 
Child,  "with  his  'satiable  Curtiosity, "  got  his  nose  with  the  help  of 
the  Bi-Colourcd  Python  Rock  Snake,  of  Kipling's  Just  So  stories? 

197 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


southern  end  of  Lake  Tanganyika  near  8°  S.  At  its 
widest  point  (including  Nyasaland)  on  the  14th  paral- 
lel of  latitude,  it  broadens  from  22°  to  36°  longitude. 
British  authority  in  Rhodesia  is  represented  by  ad- 
ministrators for  Southern  Rhodesia  and  Northern  Rho- 
desia, appointed  by  the  British  South  Africa  Company, 
with  the  approval  of  the  Secretary  of  State,  and  a  resi- 
dent Imperial  Commissioner,  who  is  the  same  for  both 
the  northern  and  southern  administrative  districts. 

Bulawayo,  near  the  southern  frontier,  is  the 
junction  point  of  the  two  lines  from  the  Cape  to 
Southern  and  Northern  Rhodesia.  The  southern 
line  runs  to  Salisbury  and  connects  there  with  the 
railway  through  Portuguese  East  Africa  to  Beira. 
From  Salisbury  there  are  several  spurs,  two  from 
Gowelo  and  one  from  a  point  near  Bulawayo  to  West 
Nicholson  in  the  south.  The  northern  Hne  makes  a 
wide  detour  to  cross  the  Zambesi  at  Livingstone,  and 
passes  through  Broken  Hills  into  Katanga  Province 
of  Belgian  Congo.  This  will  be  the  main  line  of  the 
Cape  to  Cairo  Railway,  unless  a  different  future  for 
German  East  Africa  and  for  the  spur  of  Portuguese 
East  Africa  between  Mashonaland  and  Nyasaland 
makes  possible  the  connection  of  Salisbury  and 
Blantyre,  and  a  line  from  Lake  Nyasa  to  Lake 
Victoria.  In  this  way  an  all-British  railway  from  the 
Cape  to  Cairo  could  be  realized.^ 

'  I  found,  however,  in  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan  a  strong  feeling 
that  the  railway  connection  of  Lake  Victoria  and  Khartum,  by  the 
valley  of  the  White  Nile,  is  the  very  last  project  to  be  thought  of 
in  building  the  Sudan  railway  system.  Economic  and  engineering 
reasons  seem  to  militate  against  the  building  of  this  link  of  the  Cape- 
Cairo  all-rail  route. 

198 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


The  history  of  the  development  of  Southern  and 
Northern  Rhodesia  is  not  unHke  that  of  Southern 
and  Northern  Nigeria,  one  territory  developing 
rapidly  and  becoming  self-supporting,  and  the  other, 
because  it  must  take  in  a  hinterland  of  protectorates, 
costly  to  pacify,  slow  to  yield  returns,  and  showing 
each  year  a  large  deficit.  Natiu^ally  the  colonists 
of  the  prosperous  portion — as  well  as  officials  anxious 
to  present  a  good  budget — do  not  feel  enthusiastic 
about  the  pooling  of  interests  that  would  follow 
administrative  union.  But  there  is  a  difference  in 
the  fact  that  white  colonists  have  become  much 
more  numerous  in  Rhodesia  than  in  Nigeria  and 
have  good  hopes  of  making  the  entire  country  a 
white  man's  land.  The  problem  of  unification 
has  been  complicated  by  the  grievances  of  colon- 
ists against  the  chartered  company,  and  by  the 
demand,  as  in  British  East  Africa,  for  self-govern- 
ment. 

As  early  as  1904,  there  were  plans  afoot  among  the 
settlers  of  Rhodesia  to  start  an  agitation  to  make  the 
British  Government  expropriate  the  Chartered  Com- 
pany, and  make  a  Crown  Colony  of  Southern 
Rhodesia,  In  1906,  when  Lord  Selbome  visited 
Sahsbury,  he  heard  the  grievances  of  the  settlers 
against  the  company,  and  promised  to  bring  them 
to  the  attention  of  the  Home  Government.  In  1907, 
representatives  of  Matabeleland  settlers  told  the 
directors  of  the  company  who  were  visiting  the 
country  that  the  white  colonists  demanded  a  voice 
in  their  government.  The  directors  favored  the  idea 
of  federation  of  all  Rhiodcsia,  and  an  ultimatum 

199 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


union  with  the  new  Commonwealth  that  was  in  the 
process  of  formation  in  South  Africa.  But  they  did 
not  see  how  the  settlers  could  ask  for  a  voice  in  the 
Government,  when  all  the  financial  responsibiHty 
was  being  assumed  by  the  company,  and  when  the 
company  was  investing  huge  sums  for  railway 
development.  But  in  May  the  Legislative  Council 
of  Southern  Rhodesia  passed  a  resolution  asking 
the  British  Government  to  extend  representa- 
tive government  to  Rhodesia.  There  were  now 
fourteen  thousand  Europeans  in  Southern  Rho- 
desia, and  the  revenue  of  1907  exceeded  expendi- 
ture. 

In  1908,  the  South  Africa  Company  yielded  to 
local  pressure  and  issued  new  regulations,  which 
made  taking  up  land  much  easier,  and  afforded 
settlers  better  facihties  for  transport  and  travel  on 
the  railways.  In  1913,  after  five  years  of  unexampled 
prosperity,  poHtical  activity  was  renewed.  The 
twenty-five-year  charter  of  the  South  Africa  Com- 
pany was  to  expire  on  October  29,  1914,  and  in 
extending  it,  the  Crown  reserved  the  right  to  add 
provisions  or  repeal  provisions  in  the  existing  charter. 
The  company  claimed  as  its  property  a  milhon  acres 
of  unalienated  land,  exclusive  of  native  reserves,  in 
Northern  Rhodesia.  There  was  already  a  big  land 
question  in  Southern  Rhodesia.  Colonists  held  that 
unalienated  ground  is  not  the  property  of  the  com- 
pany, but  Crown  land  administered  by  the  company 
only  because  there  is  no  other  form  as  yet  of  ad- 
ministration. The  Rhodesian  Agricultural  Union 
petitioned  the  Imperial  Government  to  constitute 

200 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


a  Royal  Commission  of  Inquiry.'  The  Executive 
Council  passed  resolutions  stating  that  the  Union 
could  not  cooperate  in  the  general  scheme  of  defense 
for  South  Africa  as  long  as  the  Chartered  Company 
were  responsible  for  the  government. 

Throughout  1913  and  1914,  there  was  much 
confusion  and  division  of  opinion  about  the  future 
among  the  Rhodesian  colonists.  They  were  all  at 
heart  against  the  Chartered  Company,  and  preferred 
some  other  form  of  government.  Rhodesia  could 
hardly  become  a  Crown  Colony,  for  then  the  Imperial 
Government  would  have  to  indemnify  the  Chartered 
Company,  and  the  country  would  be  saddled  with  a 
very  burdensome  debt.  Not  many  of  the  settlers 
were  in  favor  of  the  alternative  of  entering  the  South 
African  Commonwealth,  Sir  Starr  Jameson,  who 
had  recently  become  president  of  the  company, 
urged  the  settlers  to  support  the  Chartered  Company, 
for  the  sake  of  their  own  prosperity  and  for  the  sake 
of  the  future  poHtical  status  of  Rhodesia.  He 

'  The  land  question  in  Rhodesia  is  very  obscure.  It  depends  upon 
the  legal  interpretation  of  the  terms  of  the  charter,  and  there  is  a 
case  pending  before  the  Privy  Council  at  the  present  moment.  The 
European  settlers  are  against  the  company  to  a  man  on  the  land 
question.  But  the  company — up  to  this  time — can  scarcely  be 
accused  of  exploiting  Rhodesia  in  their  own  interests.  The  share- 
holders have  spent  millions  upon  the  country,  and  have  been  most 
liberal  in  their  attitude  toward  railway  extension.  They  have  never 
had  a  penny  of  interest.  It  is  natural  that  they  should  look  some- 
where for  a  little  reward  for  their  confidence  and  a  little  return  for 
their  money.  The  case  is  not  at  all  as  if  the  company  had  been 
enjoying  huge  profits  for  years,  and  was  trying  to  grab  more,  and  to 
prevent  colonists  from  getting  the  power  into  their  own  hands  in 
order  to  keep  going  a  profitable  investment. 

201 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


warned  them  that  the  downfall  of  the  Chartered 
Company  would  mean  the  inclusion  of  Rhodesia  in 
the  Union  instead  of  a  wonderful  independent  future. 

The  elections  to  the  Legislative  Council  in  March, 
19 14,  resulted  in  the  return  of  pro-charter  candidates. 
It  cannot  be  interpreted  as  an  out-and-out  victory 
for  the  company,  but  rather  as  the  decision  of 
Rhodesia  not  to  amalgamate  with  South  Africa. 
The  colonists  want  self-government,  and  are,  as  in 
British  East  Africa,  determined  to  get  it.  But  they 
do  not  want  it  enough  to  enter  the  South  African 
Union.  There  are  only  twenty-five  thousand  Euro- 
peans in  Rhodesia,  and  they  would  be  swamped  in 
the  midst  of  the  electorate  of  over  a  million  in  the 
other  colonies,  the  majority  of  whom  are  Dutch, 
and  would  interfere  in  many  ways,  especially  in 
compelling  the  Taal  to  be  taught  in  schools.  Most 
of  the  Rhodesians  are  of  British  extraction,  and  have 
had  a  growing  feeling  since  the  federation  was  formed 
that  they  are  "jolly  well  out  of  it."  And  they  do 
not  want  to  be  a  dumping  ground  for  all  the  failures 
and  poor  whites  who  would  work  their  way  quickly 
into  the  new  province.  Only  when  Rhodesia  has  a 
large  enough  European  population  to  be  able  to 
maintain  local  interests  in  a  federal  parliament,  and 
to  turn  the  balance  in  favor  of  the  English  against  the 
Dutch,  will  Rhodesian  colonists  be  ready  to  join  the 
Commonwealth.  In  South  Africa,  too,  the  English 
extremists  think  as  the  Rliodesians  do,  and  are 
praying  for  the  day  when  a  strong  Rhodesian  province 
— markedly  Anglo-Saxon — will  put  the  Afrikanders 
in  a  minority  in  the  Commonwealth  Parliament. 

202 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


Southern  Rhodesia,  nearest  to  South  Africa, 
nearest  to  the  mouth  of  the  Zambesi,  and  with 
railway  communications  (to  the  Indian  Ocean  at 
Beira  and  into  the  Commonwealth)  of  much  shorter 
distance  than  the  rest  of  the  country,  has  shown  a 
very  healthy  development  since  1900.  Since  1907, 
revenue  has  exceeded  expenditure.  In  1909,  the 
gold  output  was  over  two  and  a  half  million  pounds. 
In  19 10,  cotton-growing  was  started  on  an  extensive 
scale.  The  cotton  already  sent  from  Rhodesia 
brought  a  higher  price  in  the  London  market  than 
that  of  any  other  variety  except  Sea  Island  cotton 
from  the  West  Indies.  Tobacco,  citron,  and  rubber 
were  yielding  excellent  results.  In  191 1,  the  railways 
were  earning  sufficient  to  meet  interest  charges  and 
leave  a  margin.  In  191 2,  it  was  announced  that  over 
a  milhon  acres  were  being  cultivated  in  Southern 
Rhodesia,  and  that  the  Liebig  Company  had  bought 
half  a  million  acres  for  ranching  purposes.  When  the 
war  broke  out,  the  gold  production  was  increasing 
rapidly. 

As  in  other  South  African  colonies,  the  two  main 
factors  of  economic  development  are  white  settlers 
and  native  labor.  Efforts  were  made  in  1907  to 
attract  immigration  from  England  through  the 
Salvation  Army.  Great  hopes  were  based  upon 
General  Booth,  who  had  taken  up  the  scheme 
enthusiastically.  It  never  came  to  anything.  As- 
sisted immigration  is  wise  nowhere  in  Africa.  Since 
whites  will  not  do  manual  labor  of  the  kind  that 
blacks  do  or  any  kind  in  company  with  blacks,  the 
only  settlers  who  have  a  chance  to  succeed  are  those 

203 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


understanding  farming  or  stock  raising  or  with  a 
trade.  In  addition  to  being  skilled  laborers,  colonists 
must  also  have  some  capital.  Even  where  the  State 
gives  immigrants  a  start,  after  having  assisted  them 
to  come  to  the  country,  a  year  of  bad  luck  in  the 
way  of  drought  or  personal  illness  (both  are  very 
Hkely  to  happen  in  Africa)  is  apt  to  ruin  a  man  who 
has  not  funds  to  tide  him  over.'  Native  labor  is 
always  a  serious  question.  After  Nyasaland  pro- 
hibited labor  recruiting  in  191 1,  immediately  there 
was  a  scarcity  of  hands  for  agriculture  in  Southern 
Rhodesia  and  for  mines  in  Northern  Rhodesia. 
Complaint  was  made  against  the  action  of  the 
Protectorate.  But  what  could  the  Home  Govern- 
ment do  to  Nyasaland  for  adopting  a  law  which 
Rhodesia  herself  was  enforcing.? 

Northern  Rhodesia,  aided  greatly  by  the  boom  in 
gold-mining  and  by  the  extension  of  the  railway  to 
Katanga,  has  been  developing  rapidly  since  1910. 
In  1912,  Lord  Grey,  in  a  speech  at  Bulawayo  declared 
that  Northern  Rhodesia  was  Ukely  to  surpass 
Southern  Rhodesia  in  agriculture  as  well  as  mining 
during  the  near  future.  A  land  bank  was  founded, 
as  in  German  Southwest  Africa,  to  aid  settlers  in 
getting  started  by  advancing  money  on  the  security 
of  their  land.    There  were  about  fifteen  hundred 

'  Owing  to  the  fact  that  grants  for  assistance  are  a  fixed  amount 
in  the  budget,  and  cannot  be  overstepped,  an  "assisted  "  colonist  can 
look  for  a  stipulated  sum  from  the  State,  and  no  more,  no  matter 
what  happens.  There  is  no  way  of  remedying  this,  because  a  special 
fund,  set  aside  to  meet  unusual  cases,  would  be  swept  away  at  the 
first  drought  or  epidemic. 

204 


LIVINGSTONE  AND  RHODES 


Europeans  in  Rhodesia,  north  of  the  Zambesi  River, 
at  the  outbreak  of  the  war. 

One-sixth  of  the  population  of  Rhodesia  was  under 
arms  in  191 5,  and  five  hvmdred  went  to  join  Lord 
Kitchener's  army.  Rhodesian  regiments  cooperated 
for  the  conquest  of  Southwest  Africa  and  East 
Africa.  It  is  their  hope  to  get  an  outlet  both  to  the 
Indian  Ocean  and  to  the  Atlantic  through  German 
territories.  If  this  is  realized,  the  British,  through 
Rhodesia,  will  have  done  in  the  southern  part  of  the 
African  continent  what,  through  Rhodesia,  they 
prevented  the  Portuguese  from  doing — opening 
up  a  path  lander  one  flag  across  the  continent. 


205 


CHAPTER  XI 


THE  BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND 
UGANDA 

SOUTH  and  north  of  the  equator  to  the  fourth 
parallel  of  latitude  East  Africa  is  dominated  by 
the  British.  The  large  Protectorate  of  British 
East  Africa  stretches  from  the  coast  of  the  Indian 
Ocean  between  Italian  Somaliland  and  German  East 
Africa  back  to  the  headwaters  of  the  Nile.  The  Juba 
River  forms  an  eastern  inland  boundary  with  Italian 
Somaliland  from  the  equator  line  nearly  to  4°  north. 
On  the  north  are  Abyssinia  and  the  Anglo-Egyptian 
Sudan.  The  British  Protectorate  of  Uganda  is  on 
the  west,  and  Lake  Victoria  and  German  East 
Africa  on  the  south.  The  Uganda  Protectorate  is  a 
quadrangle  at  the  headwaters  of  the  Nile,  between 
Lake  Albert,  Lake  Edward,  Lake  Victoria,  and  Lake 
Rudolf,  and  surrounded  by  British  East  Africa,  the 
Belgian  Congo,  German  East  Africa,  and  the  Anglo- 
Egyptian  Sudan. 

Uganda  first  came  under  British  influence  by 
exploration.  The  British  title  was  not  established 
until  the  Germans  and  British  began  to  organize 
the  hinterland  of  their  East  African  colonies.  In 
1894,  ^  protectorate  was  declared  over  the  kingdoms 

206 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


of  Uganda  and  the  tribes  in  adjoining  territories 
that  were  known  and  accessible.  During  the  first 
decade  of  the  twentieth  century  almost  the  whole 
territory  of  the  Protectorate,  whose  population  is 
now  about  three  millions,  was  brought  under  direct 
British  administration.  Where  they  have  shown 
loyalty  and  ability,  native  chiefs  have  been  main- 
tained. One  province,  Baganda,  is  still  recognized 
as  a  native  kingdom.  Although  the  soil  is  exceedingly 
fertile,  and  the  development  of  lake  commimication 
and  the  completion  of  the  railway  through  British 
East  Africa  to  the  coast  have  given  excellent  means 
of  transport,  the  climate  of  Uganda  causes  it  to  be 
avoided  by  settlers.  There  are  only  a  thousand 
Europeans  in  the  country,  of  whom  considerably 
more  than  a  quarter  are  Government  officials. 

The  railway  from  Mombasa  reached  Lake  Victoria 
in  1 901 .  It  enabled  the  British  to  bring  Indian  troops 
into  the  country  in  fourteen  days.  The  importance 
of  the  Protectorate,  from  the  moment  ofi  ts  establish- 
ment, has  been  political  rather  than  economic.  It 
was  essential  for  the  British  to  have  control  of  this 
district  in  order  to  destroy  the  power  of  the  Dervishes 
in  the  Sudan.  Money  and  energy  were  put  into 
Uganda,  as  into  Somaliland,  to  keep  it  from  falling 
into  the  hands  of  another  Power.  If  the  British  had 
not  gone  into  Uganda,  the  Germans  certainly  would 
have  extended  their  territory  north  around  the 
western  coast  of  Lake  Victoria. 

Winston  Churchill,  after  his  African  visit,  declared 
that  Uganda  was  the  jewel  of  the  Empire  in  East 
Africa,  that  its  negroes  were  the  most  intelligent  he 

207 


\ 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


had  seen,  and  that  the  country  was  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  gardens  in  the  world.  He  beUeved  that 
when  Uganda  was  developed,  its  traffic  would  make 
the  railway  a  paying  concern.  At  last  reports, 
however,  Uganda  was  still  costing  Great  Britain 
very  much  more  than  it  yielded,  and  trade  was 
alarmingly  large  with  the  Germans  and  Belgians. 

The  importance  of  Uganda  in  the  history  of  Euro- 
pean expansion  in  Africa  is  that  its  creation  pre- 
vented the  Germans  from  controling  Lake  Victoria 
and  the  Belgians  from  reaching  Lake  Victoria.  It 
has  rounded  out  the  territory  of  the  British  East 
African  Colony,  and  gives  to  Britain  control  of  the 
headwaters  of  the  White  Nile. 

During  the  period  of  our  review,  the  devastation  of 
sleeping  sickness,  the  remarkable  development  of 
Christianity,  and  the  interest  taken  in  farming  by  the 
native  chiefs  are  the  events  of  general  interest  in 
Uganda. 

Throughout  central  Africa  sleeping  sickness,  a 
fever  carried  by  the  tsetse  fly,  is  the  most  formidable 
barrier  to  the  progress  of  European  civilization.  It 
has  prevented  the  spread  of  white  colonization.  By 
suddenly  ruining  great  districts,  calculations  of 
financial  return  are  made  so  uncertain  that  railway 
construction,  where  there  is  no  political  reason  to 
prompt  and  justify  it,  has  been  retarded.  In  German 
and  British  East  Africa,  in  northern  Rhodesia,  in 
the  two  large  Portuguese  colonies,  in  the  Belgian 
Congo,  and  in  French  Equatorial  Africa,  sleeping 
sickness  has  made  great  ravages  during  the  past 
twenty  years.   It  has  hampered  the  development  of 

208 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


the  southern  Sudan.  But  its  worst  effects  have  been 
felt  on  the  islands  and  the  Uganda  shore  of  Lake 
Victoria,  which  were  entirely  depopulated  in  1908. 
Two-thirds  of  the  population  of  the  protectorate  had 
died  in  six  years.  In  many  places  the  disease  dis- 
appeared for  lack  of  people  to  attack.  Famine 
followed  plague.  The  survivors  were  starving  to 
death  by  the  thousands.  This  calamity,  far  worse 
than  any  earthquake  and  comparable  in  modern 
times  only  to  Chinese  and  Indian  famines,  awakened 
the  Powers  who  had  interests  in  Africa  to  the  neces- 
sity of  common  action  for  combating  the  plague. 
But  no  more  in  medical  than  in  political  matters  are 
international  jealousies  able  to  be  compounded. 
The  second  international  conference  in  1908  closed 
without  coming  to  any  decision,  because  the  French 
and  Italian  delegates  were  opposed  to  establishing 
in  London  the  central  bureau  of  the  international 
organization. ' 

The  British  sent  a  special  sanitary  mission  to 
Africa.  Segregation  camps  were  established  in 
Uganda,  where  the  Peres  Blancs  of  the  Algerian 
mission  did  a  work  that  brought  much  power  and 
influence  to  the  native  Catholic  Church.  After 
three  years  it  was  announced  that  preventive 
measures  were  beginning  to  save  lives  from  sleeping 
sickness.   But  the  problem  still  remains. 

In  Uganda,  Christianity  has  made  more  rapid 
progress  than  in  any  other  part  of  Africa.  There  are 
over  two  hundred  thousand  baptized  converts,  and 

'  Great  Britain  and  Germany  later  appointed  a  joint  commission 
to  study  sleeping  sickness  for  three  years. 
14  209 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  rest  of  the  Baganda  race  is  under  Christian 
influence.  The  adherents  are  almost  equally  divided 
between  English  Protestants  and  French  Catholics. 

Unique  in  African  history  is  the  way  that  agricul- 
tural development,  along  European  lines,  has  been 
taken  hold  of  by  the  Uganda  natives.  One  can 
attribute  this  for  the  most  part  to  the  influence  of 
Christianity.  We  cannot  expect  Moslems  and 
Pagans  to  comprehend  and  appreciate  and  take 
advantage  of  the  European  way  of  doing  things  until 
they  have  adopted  the  European  religion.  Not  only 
our  institutions,  political  and  social  and  economic, 
but  also  our  manner  of  thought,  are  the  result  of 
centuries  of  an  evolution  that  has  been  shaped  and 
dominated  by  Christianity.  In  1913,  the  Baganda 
chiefs  were  reported  as  owners  of  large  rubber  and 
cotton  plantations,  and  fast  growing  rich.  The 
official  report  stated:  "It  is  gratifying  to  note  that 
contact  with  civilization  has  not  had  a  deteriorating 
effect."  Is  the  reason  of  this  to  be  found  in  an 
inherent  superiority  of  the  Uganda  natives  to  those 
of  other  parts  of  Africa,  or  in  their  acceptance  of 
Christianity?  The  British  Government  has  or- 
ganized the  country,  spent  large  sums  of  money  on 
it,  and  brought  it  into  railway  communication  with 
the  outside  world.  But  to  the  French  Catholic  and 
English  Protestant  missionaries  is  due  the  unique 
place  of  the  Uganda  natives  in  Africa.  Unless  they 
are  given  the  moral  foundation  upon  which  to  build, 
material  prosperity  that  comes  with  European  con- 
trol is  to  aboriginal  races  certain  destruction — a 
rapid  disappearance  following  deterioration. 

210 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


The  British  came  into  possession  of  the  southern 
half  of  the  coast  Hne  of  the  East  Africa  Protectorate, 
from  the  northern  mouth  of  the  Tana  River  to  the 
Umba  River  through  the  connection  with  Zanzibar. 
The  Sultan's  dominions  extended  only  ten  miles 
inland,  and  were  leased  from  him  by  the  British. 
Between  the  Tana  River  and  the  Juba  British 
sovereignty  was  established,  as  in  the  interior,  by  a 
vague  harking  back  to  Egyptian  rights  and  a  practi- 
cal opening  up  and  occupation  of  the  country,  treaties 
being  made  with  local  chieftains  as  the  penetration 
progressed.  A  frontier  was  gradually  decided  upon 
with  the  Germans  on  the  south,  carried  from  the 
coast  where  spheres  were  definitely  established,  to 
Karangu  Bay  on  Lake  Victoria. 

The  frontier  with  Uganda  is  marked  by  Lakes 
Victoria  and  Rudolf  and  a  line  drawn  from  one  to 
the  other.  While  the  British  were  establishing  the 
hinterland  of  West  Africa  and  extending  their 
Protectorate  over  the  natives  of  Uganda,  British 
and,  Egyptian  troops  were  reconquering  the  Sudan. 
The  settling  of  Sudan  frontiers  with  Belgium  and 
Abyssinia  and  Italy  was  accompanied  at  the  same 
time  (1902  to  1906)  by  the  fixing  of  Uganda  bounda- 
ries with  Belgium  and  West  African  boundaries  with 
Abyssinia  and  Italy.  The  British  possessions  then 
came  to  an  understanding  among  themselves,  made 
easy  by  the  fact  that  their  interests  were  all  in  the 
hands  of  the  same  arbiter,  and  that  local  opposing 
influences  were  lacking.  The  "all  red"  stretch  from 
the  Indian  Ocean  to  the  Mediterranean  by  way  of 
West  Africa,  Uganda,  the  Sudan,  and  Egypt  became 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


a  reality  between  1898  and  1906.  Although  the 
British  flag  waves  over  nearly  a  third  of  the  continent, 
this  is  the  only  place  in  Africa  where  British  posses- 
sions reach  from  one  sea  to  another. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  the 
East  Africa  Protectorate  was  an  inchoate  jumble  of 
territories  under  the  administration  of  the  Foreign 
Offlce.  Not  until  the  end  of  1906  were  Orders  in 
Council  issued  to  establish  a  definite  status  for  the 
country.  A  Governor- General  and  Commander-in- 
Chief  were  appointed,  and  Executive  and  Legislative 
Councils,  the  former  consisting  of  the  Governor  and 
four  members,  and  the  latter  of  eight  official  and  four 
unofficial  members.  Although  still  called  a  Protec- 
torate, British  East  Africa  has  become  virtually  a 
Crown  Colony.  When  the  strip  on  the  coast  leased 
from  Zanzibar  was  freed  of  foreign  consular  jurisdic- 
tion in  1908,  the  last  vestige  of  the  technical  Zanzi- 
bar connection  disappeared.  The  four  provinces  of 
1900  have  now  been  increased  to  seven,  and  effective 
administrative  control  is  exercised  throughout  the 
Protectorate,  except  in  the  northeastern  districts. 

As  in  German  East  Africa,  the  history  of  pacifica- 
tion and  economic  development  is  the  history  of  the 
progress  of  the  railway  from  the  coast  through  the 
interior  to  the  western  confines  of  the  country.  The 
line  starts  at  Mombasa  on  a  small  island  close  to  the 
coast  in  the  southern  part  of  the  Protectorate  and 
ends  at  Port  Florence  on  Lake  Victoria.  On  the 
lake,  steamers  make  the  connection  with  Uganda. 
From  Nairobi,  the  capital  and  most  important 
interior  city,  there  is  a  spur  north  to  Fort  Hall. 

212 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


Some  distance  nearer  the  coast  a  branch  runs  west 
to  Lake  Magadi.  The  railway  was  completed  soon 
after  the  opening  of  the  twentieth  century.  The 
southern  portion  of  British  East  Africa  has  enjoyed 
the  advantages  of  railway  communication  through- 
out the  period  of  our  survey. 

The  railway  has  cost  over  £6,000,000,  two  and  one- 
half  millions  in  excess  of  the  estimates.  But  there 
has  never  been  any  doubt  about  the  political  wisdom 
and  financial  soundness  of  the  investment.  As 
everywhere  else  in  Africa,  railway  communication  is 
a  sine  qua  non  of  effective  administrative  control  and 
of  economic  development.  As  in  the  neighboring 
Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan,  the  railway,  owned  and  run 
by  the  State,  brings  in  a  handsome  profit,  which 
makes  the  difference  between  deficit  and  surplus  in 
the  budget.  From  iQioto  1913,  the  deficit  of  British 
East  Africa,  thanks  to  the  railway,  was  cut  down 
substantially  and  progressively.  In  1914  the  colony 
became  self-supporting. 

We  have  seen  how  the  business  basis  upon 
which  the  finances  of  the  Sudan  were  organized 
and  managed,  and  the  excellent  budget  showing, 
prompted  the  Imperial  Parliament  to  pass  without 
hesitation,  shortly  before  the  outbreak  of  the  Euro- 
pean War,  a  bill  to  guarantee  interest  on  a  three 
million  pound  loan.  The  same  facility  was  accorded 
to  British  East  Africa  and  Uganda  in  1914. 

Up  to  1908,  the  railway  to  Lake  Victoria  from  the 
coast  had  profited  enormously  by  Belgian  and  Ger- 
man through  trade.  But  after  the  remarkable 
achievement  of  the  Germans  in  pushing  through 

213 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


their  railway  to  the  upper  end  of  Lake  Tanganyika, 
a  serious  falHng  off  in  railway  receipts  was  expected. 
The  rapid  development  of  the  country,  however, 
produced  the  surprising  and  gratifying  result  of  a 
railway  profit  of  £66,000  in  191 1.  Sheep  were  doing 
very  well  in  the  highlands.  There  was  a  great  in- 
crease in  cotton,  lumber,  and  hemp  export.  Silver 
was  beginning  to  be  exported.  Gold  was  discovered. 
In  1913,  although  there  was  a  decrease  in  rubber  and 
the  ivory  trade  was  dwindling  rapidly,  the  total 
amount  of  the  trade  of  British  East  Africa  had 
increased  seventy-five  per  cent,  in  five  years,  and  a 
good  seventy  per  cent,  of  it  was  with  the  British 
Empire. 

The  northern  part  of  the  Protectorate,  between  the 
Tana  and  the  Juba  rivers  and  west  from  Lake  Rudolf 
to  the  border  of  Italian  Somaliland,  has  not  yet  been 
developed,  and  is  the  only  part  of  British  West 
Africa  to  which  the  authority  of  the  Government  does 
not  extend  without  constant  military  expeditions. 
The  Ogaden  Somalis,  who  cause  so  much  trouble  to 
the  British  and  Italians  in  Somaliland,  raid  fre- 
quently the  northern  part  of  British  East  Africa. 
As  in  Somaliland,  the  Home  Government  has 
opposed  a  forward  policy,  and  has  refrained  from 
occupying  interior  posts.  The  Ogaden  Somalis  are 
left  to  quarrel  among  themselves.  After  ten  years  of 
comparative  quiet,  the  Somalis  proved  in  British 
East  Africa  as  in  Somaliland  that  they  would  and 
could  take  advantage  of  a  Government  which  shirked 
its  responsibilities.  In  the  spring  of  1914,  there  were 
serious  disturbances  in  Jubaland  province.  The 

214 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


Somalis  seemed  to  have  got  a  plentiful  supply  of 
rifles  and  ammunition  from  Abyssinia.  They  re- 
fused to  submit  to  disarmament,  and  attacked 
British  fortified  posts.  Troops  had  to  be  hurried 
from  Uganda  and  Nyasaland.  The  Somalis,  aban- 
doning bush  tactics,  tried  to  rush  the  British  forces, 
who  were  saved  only  by  their  machine  gtms.  When 
the  general  war  began,  the  trouble  had  died  down, 
but  by  no  means  could  it  be  said  to  have  ended. 
After  peace  is  restored  in  Europe  and  Africa,  the 
British  Government  must  either  occupy  this  north- 
em  coimtry,  or  by  strict  coastal  control  and  bringing 
pressure  to  bear  upon  Abyssinia  effect  a  stoppage  of 
traffic  in  arms.  As  long  as  the  Somalis  have  good 
rifles  and  plenty  of  ammunition  they  will  be  a  thorn 
in  the  flesh. 

Christian  missionaries  working  in  common  or 
adjoining  fields  have  foimd  throughout  the  world 
that  unity  is  essential,  if  real  progress  is  to  be  made  in 
converting  pagans  and  Moslems.  In  the  untutored 
mind  there  is  room  only  for  the  essential  fact  of 
Christ  redeeming  men  from  sin  through  their  con- 
fession of  faith  in  Him  and  their  dedication  of  life  to 
His  service.  Antagonistic  and  competitive  mission- 
ary propaganda  is  damning  to  the  common  cause. 
A  native  may  be  able  to  appreciate  the  difference 
between  the  Catholic  and  Protestant  point  of  view. 
But  when  it  comes  to  distinctions  between  various 
Protestant  sects,  the  effect  on  the  native  convert  is 
disastrous.  From  personal  investigation  in  many 
mission  fields,  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
dcnominationalism   in   missionary   propaganda  is 

215 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


criminal  folly.  It  leads  to  lives  wasted  in  fruitless 
effort  and  useless  sacrifice.  It  creates  a  prejudice 
against  Christianity  on  the  part  of  those  who  are 
being  "reached."  It  means  throwing  away  for 
nothing  the  money  of  those  who  support  missionary 
organizations. 

AngHcans  and  Episcopalians  on  the  mission  field 
must  make  common  cause  with  other  Protestant 
denominations,  emphasizing  the  evangelical  note  in 
their  preaching,  or  "renounce  their  schism"  and 
join  the  Roman  CathoHc  Chixrch.  There  is  place  for 
a  middle  ground  in  Europe  and  America,  where 
Christianity  has  a  historical  background.  But  there 
is  no  place  for  "straddHng"  in  a  pagan  country. 
This  truth  was  brought  out  in  the  missionary  con- 
ference at  Kikuyu,  where  Anglicans,  Presbyterians, 
Baptists,  Methodists,  and  Congregationalists  met  to 
discuss  plans  for  unity  of  action  among  the  natives. 
The  Bishop  of  Uganda  described  the  aim  of  the 
Conference  to  be  for  an  ultimate  "union  of  native 
Christians  in  one  native  Church.'"  At  the  close,  the 
Bishop  of  Mombasa,  assisted  by  the  Bishop  of 
Uganda,  administered  the  sacrament  to  members  of 
the  Conference,  irrespective  of  their  denomination, 
in  the  Scotch  Presbyterian  Church.  It  was  an  epoch- 
making  event  in  the  history  of  Christian  missions  in 
Africa.  The  fraternizing — even  to  the  sacraments — 
of  AngUcans  and  other  Protestants  aroused  a  great 
deal  of  excitement  and  indignation  among  narrow- 
minded  fanatics  in  England.  When  the  Bishop  of 
Zanzibar  charged  the  Bishops  of  Uganda  and  East 
Africa  with  heresy,  it  showed  that  mediseval  bigotry 

216 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


had  found  its  way  into  the  chtirch  militant  in  Africa, 
to  weaken  and  paralyze  effort  where  strength  and 
stimulus  were  needed. 

The  chief  interest  of  British  East  Africa  from  the 
point  of  view  of  Europe  in  Africa  since  1900  is  the 
experiment  of  white  colonization.  It  is  important 
for  us  to  follow  the  movement  to  attract  white 
settlers  to  the  Protectorate,  and  to  note  how  the 
same  questions  presented  themselves  as  in  other 
British  colonies  in  Africa,  economic  competition  with 
natives,  the  color  question,  the  exclusion  of  Asiatics, 
the  demand  for  self-government.  What  has  happened 
in  this  colony  is  of  utmost  value  in  throwing  light 
upon  the  solution  of  problems  that  arise  everywhere 
in  Africa. 

In  1902,  Commander  Whitehouse  completed  a 
survey  of  Lake  Victoria,  which  had  taken  him  more 
than  a  year  to  make.  He  announced  that  he  had 
found  on  the  east  side  of  the  lake  a  forty-mile  stretch 
of  enclosed  water  at  the  mouth  of  which  was  a 
valuable  tract  of  high  country  and  a  large  population. 
He  was  of  the  opinion  that  there  was  a  possibility 
of  this  becoming  a  white  man's  country.  Mr.  Cham- 
berlain took  back  to  England  the  same  opinion,  after 
he  had  visited  Mombasa  and  had  gone  inland  for  a 
short  trip  on  the  railway.  In  1903,  the  Governor, 
Sir  Charles  Elliott,  said  that  a  large  part  of  the 
Protectorate  was  a  white  man's  country,  and  that,  if 
European  settlers  and  merchants  were  encouraged, 
British  East  Africa  would  pay  its  way  in  ten  years 
at  the  very  most.  In  1907,  Mr.  Winston  Churchill 
crossed  the  Protectorate  on  his  way  to  Cairo  via  the 

217 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Great  Lakes,  At  Nairobi  he  declared  that  the 
highlands  was  certainly  a  white  man's  country,  that 
the  Government  would  reward  settlers  with  market- 
able titles,  and  would  prevent  absenteeism  by  ex- 
propriation. In  1909,  Mr.  Roosevelt  said  at  Nairobi 
that  the  country  was  "a  real  white  man's  land," 
and  besides,  "the  most  attractive  playground  in 
the  world. " 

Glowing  official  reports,  added  to  the  widely 
heralded  remarks  from  distinguished  travelers,  at- 
tracted white  settlers.  They  began  to  flock  to 
Mombasa.  The  discovery  of  diamonds  near  Nairobi 
in  1907  brought  more  white  men  to  the  interior,  and 
Nairobi  became  rapidly  a  European  city.  But  from 
the  very  beginning  there  were  difficulties.  Racial 
and  political  agitation  arose,  as  is  inevitable  wherever 
the  Anglo-Saxon  goes- 
Like  many  other  colonies,  beginning  with  the 
famous  example  of  India,  a  chartered  company  was 
the  original  developing  agency.  As  long  as  there 
were  only  natives  to  exploit,  the  company  met  with 
no  opposition.  But  the  moment  the  British  colonist 
appeared,  the  company  was  a  competitor,  and  was 
opposed  at  every  turn.  The  conflict  was  brought  out 
in  rather  an  unusual  and  very  public  way  by  the 
quarrel  between  Sir  Charles  Elliott  and  the  Home 
Government.  In  1904,  Sir  Charles  resigned  the  High 
Commissionership,  and  asked  for  a  public  inquiry 
into  the  circumstances  of  his  resignation.  He 
charged  that  Lord  Lansdowne  had  ordered  him  to 
refuse  grants  of  land  to  certain  private  persons,  while 
giving  monopoly  of  land  on  unduly  advantageous 

2l8 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


terms  to  the  East  Africa  Syndicate.  Sir  Charles 
resigned  rather  than  execute  instructions  which  he 
regarded  as  unjust  and  impolitic.  The  Foreign  Office 
ignored  the  demand  for  a  public  inquiry,  but  issued  a 
statement  to  the  effect  that  the  East  Africa  Syndi- 
cate employed  a  large  staff,  was  a  responsible  body, 
and  had  spent  a  great  deal  of  money  on  its  enterprises 
up  to  that  stage.  Sir  Charles  replied  that  the  money 
had  been  spent  on  a  fruitless  search  for  minerals,  and 
that  the  principle  of  a  new  company  concession  was 
bad,  for  it  would  exclude  genuine  colonization  and 
European  settlement.  The  granting  of  small  private 
concessions  was  the  only  policy  to  follow,  if  the 
proper  sort  of  white  settlers  were  to  be  attracted  to 
East  Africa. 

The  white  colonists  were  opposed  not  only  to 
company  concessions,  but  also  to  the  introduction  of 
Jews  and  Indians,  limited  leasehold  of  land  grants, 
"favoritism"  toward  natives,  and  government 
without  representation.  Wherever  John  Bull  goes 
he  holds  out  for  the  good  and  bad  in  Anglo-Saxon- 
dom,  just  as  vigorously  if  the  flag  over  the  land  where 
he  settles  is  British  as  if  it  is  of  an  alien  government. 

I.  No  Jews  or  Asiatics.  When  Mr.  Chamberlain 
visited  the  Protectorate,  he  conceived  the  idea  of 
offering  land  to  the  Zionist  movement.  When  he 
first  broached  the  subject  in  England,  a  howl  of 
protest  went  forth  from  the  few  hundred  Englishmen 
already  in  British  East  Africa.  No  Jews  from 
Central  or  Southeastern  Europe,  of  the  type  that 
private  charity  would  set  up  in  life,  were  wanted  as 
neighbors  in  agriculture.    They  certainly  were  not 

219 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


wanted  as  competitors  in  small  commerce.  The 
Imperial  Government  paid  no  attention  to  the  pro- 
tests. A  commission  was  sent  out  to  examine 
territory  available  for  Zionist  settlement.  The  com- 
mission went  to  Uganda,  and  decided  to  offer  land 
there  to  the  Zionists,  The  Zionist  Congress  at  Basle, 
in  1905,  decHned  the  offer.  Small  wonder!  For  I 
suppose  some  of  them  had  read  the  report  of  the 
High  Commissioner  of  Uganda  for  1904,  which  was 
published  shortly  before  the  Congress  assembled. 
In  it  occiu-s  this  sentence:  "Uganda  will  never  be  a 
white  man's  cotmtry,  for  it  has  no  areas,  as  in  East 
Africa,  suitable  to  white  colonization." 

There  were  many  Indians  in  Zanzibar  and  East 
Africa  before  the  coming  of  the  white  settlers.  Here 
was  a  country,  directly  controlled  by  the  British 
Crown,  where  conditions,  which  Her  Majesty's 
Government  made  a  casus  belli  against  the  Boers  of 
the  Transvaal,  did  not  prevail.  The  Indian,  being  a 
British  subject,  had  the  right  to  settle  wherever  the 
British  flag  flew.  But  the  moment  white  settlers 
came  in  nimibers  to  British  East  Africa,  agitation 
against  the  Indians  commenced.  When  Mr.  Winston 
Chvirchill  said  at  Nairobi  that  the  whites  required 
the  cooperation  of  Indians  in  developing  the  immense 
areas  of  the  highlands,  the  statement  was  received 
in  silence.  But  much  approval  was  expressed  at  his 
later  modification  that  it  was  a  mistake  to  introduce 
artificially  Asiatic  population  before  the  country 
was  ready.  Only  he  was  told  that  the  country  never 
would  be  ready  for  that,  unless  he  wanted  to  drive 
away  the  white  men  there  and  discourage  other  white 

220 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


men  from  coming.  In  1910,  the  London  All  India 
Moslem  League  protested  to  the  Colonial  Office 
against  the  exclusion  of  East  Indians  from  the  high- 
lands, v/here  the  best  areas  for  settlement  were  alone 
available.  It  was  contended  that  as  indentured 
Indian  labor  was  being  used  to  develop  British  East 
Africa,  it  was  imfair  to  prevent  Indians  whose  time 
had  expired  from  getting  the  good  lands  of  the 
country  for  which  they  were  performing  essential 
service.  The  Government  was  warned  that  the 
maintenance  of  anti-Indian  prejudice  and  discrimina- 
tion in  East  African  legislation  would  react  on  the 
political  situation  in  India.  It  is  the  same  story  as 
in  South  Africa.  Although  when  the  war  broke  out, 
the  question  of  the  reservation  of  the  highlands  for 
European  settlement  had  not  been  decided,  it  is 
certain  that,  unless  this  action  is  taken,  British  East 
Africa  has  no  chance  whatever  of  becoming  a  white 
man's  country. 

2.  No  land  grants  with  a  string  attached.  When 
the  Britisher  leaves  his  island,  where  all  the  land  is 
in  the  hands  of  a  few,  to  start  a  new  life,  he  wants  to 
own  land,  and  to  know  that  it  is  really  his  and  that 
its  increased  value  through  his  own  efforts  or  the 
development  of  the  community  will  accrue  to  him. 
He  wants  the  chance  of  enjoying  what  the  privileged 
classes  of  England  enjoy.  The  British  Government 
did  not  seem  to  appreciate  this  in  adopting  a  land 
policy  for  East  Africa.  In  order,  as  Lord  Elgin  said, 
to  hamper  speculative  acquisition  and  the  locking 
up  of  the  land,  such  as  had  occurred  in  the  earlier 
years  in  Australasia,  land  was  to  be  leased  for  ninety- 

221 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


nine  years,  with  reassessment  after  the  thirty-third 
and  sixty-sixth  years.  The  settlers  protested  against 
these  terms.  They  said  that  this  form  of  land  grant 
would  bar  the  flow  of  capital  into  the  country,  and 
would  not  attract  the  right  kind  of  settlers.  In  1908, 
after  the  limited  leasehold  policy  was  adopted,  there 
were  several  failures  among  small  farmers  in  the 
highlands,  and  applications  for  taking  up  land  fell  off. 

For  several  years  there  was  continued  agitation  to 
return  to  the  old  system  of  out  and  out  aHenation  of 
land.  Sir  Percy  Girouard  (who  would  not  have  been 
a  high  British  official  were  he  not  enjoying  the  fruits 
of  his  ancestors'  refusal  to  assent  to  any  such  scheme) 
defended  the  Colonial  Office  in  their  refusal  to  change 
the  leasehold  policy,  and  advised  the  settlers  not  to 
retard  the  development  of  the  country  by  renewing 
the  agitation.  Sir  Percy  painted  in  glowing  terms 
the  possibiUties  of  the  future.  British  East  Africa 
might  soon  be  regarded  as  a  new  source  of  wheat 
supply  for  Britain,  for  the  wheat  grown  compared 
favorably  with  that  imported  from  France.  Beans 
of  various  kinds  could  be  produced  in  abundance  for 
export  and  cattle  feed.  There  were  immense  possi- 
bilities in  timber  and  silver.  A  rich  harvest  in  cotton, 
rubber,  and  hemp  was  awaiting  the  white  men  who 
would  cast  in  their  fortunes  with  the  colony.  Men 
with  capital  of  from  £800  to  £4000  were  urged  to 
come.  Men  without  means  were  needed  to  work 
under  large  landowners.  But  in  spite  of  the  increase 
of  the  prosperity  of  the  Protectorate,  land  under  the 
leasehold  policy  went  begging. 

In  1913,  the  Legislative  Council  was  informed  that 
222 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


the  Colonial  Office  would  accept  the  following 
principles  of  land  policy:  abolition  of  occupation 
licenses  and  issue  of  transfer  licenses;  abohtion  of 
requirement  of  personal  occupation,  if  a  manager  be 
left  in  charge ;  stock  to  be  included  in  assessing  value 
of  development  work,  expenditure  on  which  would  be 
extended  over  five  years.  These  concessions  were 
regarded  as  a  step  in  the  right  direction.  But  the 
agitation  continued. 

In  abstract  principle,  the  Colonial  Office  has  acted 
in  an  enlightened  manner  in  regard  to  land  settlement 
provisions.  Experience  has  certainly  taught  the 
advisability  of  a  government,  when  conditions  of 
land  ownership  are  to  be  created,  making  those 
conditions  preventive  of  absentee  landlordism, 
fraudulent  transfers,  and  holding  land  undeveloped 
until  the  development  by  neighbors  or  the  work  of 
the  community  gives  the  proprietor  a  wholly  im- 
eamed  increment.  But  in  land  legislation  one  can 
neither  go  against  human  nature,  nor  prevent  the 
working  of  the  old  law  that  to  him  who  hath  shall 
be  given.  Large  estates  are  inevitable.  The  only 
logical  way  of  securing  for  the  Commonwealth  the 
advantage  of  land  values  created  by  Government 
initiative  and  the  industry  of  the  whole  people,  and 
of  preventing  selfish  landowners  from  holding  un- 
developed land  for  an  unearned  increment,  is  to  put 
the  tax  on  land  values  and  not  on  improvements. 

3.  No  social  or  political  equality  J  or  the  black  man. 
Experience  would  have  led  one  to  prophesy  in  all 
safety  that  the  coming  of  white  colonists  into  British 
East  Africa  would  soon  create  a  native  question. 

223 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Very  few  years  of  white  colonization  led  to  the 
necessity  of  a  special  parliamentary  paper  on  the 
relations  between  whites  and  negroes.'  The  official 
element  in  the  Protectorate  had  long  been  accus- 
tomed to  act  with  severity  against  Europeans  who 
maltreated  natives.  For  there  were  few  Europeans, 
and  those  generally  a  bad  lot;  and  injustice  and 
cruelty  on  the  part  of  whites  often  brought  serious 
troubles  with  the  natives.  From  the  official  point  of 
view,  wholly  aside  from  considerations  of  justice 
and  humanity,  it  was  easier  to  be  severe  on  one  white 
man  than  to  have  to  send  an  expedition  to  put  down  a 
native  uprising.  But  when  colonists  began  to  come, 
the  officials  discovered  that  there  was  a  most  alarm- 
ing solidarity  among  them  to  prevent  justice  being 
done  to  native  victims  of  the  white  man's  temper 
and  arbitrary  punishment.  Some  Englishmen  were 
prosecuted  for  flogging  natives  in  1907,  and  were 
convicted  and  sentenced.  Much  feeling  was  aroused 
against  the  officials,  and  serious  consequences  might 
have  resulted  had  not  the  sentences  been  reversed 
upon  appeal. 

In  1908,  there  was  an  unruly  demonstration  before 
the  Governor's  residence,  largely  on  the  ground  of 
what  the  white  settlers  called  his  "pro-native" 
poHcy.  In  191 1,  the  Honorable  Galbraith  Cole  shot 
dead  a  native  who  was  trespassing  on  his  farm. 
Although  incontestable  evidence  of  his  guilt  was 
produced  at  the  trial,  and  only  a  verdict  of  man- 
slaughter asked  for  by  the  prosecuting  attorney,  the 
white  jury  acquitted  him.    The  Colonial  Secretary 

■  See  Cd.  3562. 

224 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


then  ordered  the  deportation  of  Mr.  Cole.  The 
settlers  in  British  East  Africa  protested  against  the 
illegality  of  this  action  and  what  they  termed  the 
persecution  of  one  of  their  number,  and  urged  Mr. 
Cole  at  the  time  of  his  forced  departure  to  bring 
action  against  the  Colonial  Office  in  the  English 
courts.  In  1913,  a  native  labor  commission,  studying 
the  serious  difficulties  that  were  arising  from  the 
presence  of  white  settlers,  recommended  the  appoint- 
ment of  a  native  commissioner,  a  demarcation  of 
native  reserves,  increased  taxation  and  registration 
of  natives,  government  control  of  labor  recruiting, 
and  restriction  of  liquor  consumption  by  natives. 

4.  No  government  without  representation.  As  we 
stated  above,  East  Africa  was  a  growth.  It  started 
in  the  coast-land  lease  from  the  Sultan  of  Zanzibar, 
and  gradually  developed  by  a  penetration  in  the 
hinterland,  and  a  proclamation  of  sovereignty  over 
Jubaland.  The  original  economic  development  was 
in  the  hands  of  a  private  company,  whose  charter 
included  also  Zanzibar.  Not  until  1906  was  there  a 
settled  form  of  government.  Colonists  in  numbers 
and  diamond  prospectors  first  came  at  that  time. 
Not  a  year  had  passed  after  the  system  of  govern- 
ment, had  been  established  before  agitation  started 
for  some  form  of  self-government.  When  Mr. 
Winston  Churchill  passed  through  the  country  in 
1907,  he  told  the  settlers  that  the  Legislative  Council 
had  been  established  for  criticism  of  the  administra- 
tion and  not  for  its  control. 

The  unsatisfactory  land  poHcy  of  the  Colonial 
Office  and  the  agitation  over  the  punishment  of 
IS  225 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


white  men  who  acted  as  their  own  judges  of  natives 
hastened  what  inevitably  would  have  come  later — 
the  demand  for  local  representation  in  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  Protectorate.  The  Indian  agitation  of 
1 910  increased  the  determination  of  the  settlers  to 
have  some  voice  in  decisions  affecting  their  interests. 
Sir  Percy  Girouard's  tactic  of  calling  attention  to  the 
material  benefits  that  settlers  were  receiving,  and  the 
advantages  that  would  be  theirs  in  the  future  "if 
only  they  ceased  to  harm  the  colony  and  scare  away 
colonists  by  their  senseless  agitation, "  was  typically 
Tory,  and  did  not  go  where  there  were  Englishmen 
instead  of  natives  to  deal  with.  Enghsh  newspapers 
were  established  at  Mombasa  and  Nairobi.'  The 
settlers  began  to  organize  to  compel  the  recognition 
of  their  right  to  participate  in  the  Government  of 
the  Colony.  In  19 13,  the  Settlers'  Association  peti- 
tioned the  Colonial  Office  that  the  unofficial  minority 
of  the  Council  be  elected  instead  of  nominated.  Mr. 
Harcourt,  radical  in  England,  had  no  sympathy  with 
liberalism  in  East  Africa.  His  reply  evaded  the 
issue.  The  unofficial  members  of  the  Council,  except 
one,  resigned.  Up  to  the  outbreak  of  the  European 
War,  Nairobi  was  the  center  of  continual  agitation 
for  a  form  of  self-government,  which  would  begin  by 
making  elective  the  representatives  of  the  Legislative 
Council,  and  liberally  extending  the  powers  of  that 
body. 

The  Home  Government  point  of  view,  unanimously 
sustained  by  officials  in  British  East  Africa,  is  that 
the  white  settlers  of  British  origin  are  as  yet  far  too 

'  In  1913  also  at  Entebbe,  in  Uganda. 

226 


BRITISH  IN  EAST  AFRICA  AND  UGANDA 


few  in  number  to  make  self-government  feasible. 
The  country  is  large,  and  must  depend  upon  the 
Home  Government  to  guarantee  its  loans,  to  safe- 
guard capital  already  invested,  and  to  attract  new 
capital  in  London  that  will  be  put  into  the  Colony 
only  if  the  investors  are  assured  that  the  reins  of 
government  continue  to  be  firmly  held  by  the 
Colonial  Office.  Then,  too,  settlers  have  not  yet 
given  proof  of  a  desire  to  deal  justly  and  equitably 
with  the  natives,  who  are  the  wards  of  the  British 
Empire. 

Since  the  outbreak  of  the  European  War,  the  white 
settlers  in  British  East  Africa,  regardless  of  origin, 
have  shown  great  devotion  to  the  Empire,  and  many 
of  them  have  risked  and  sacrificed  their  lives  in  the 
long  and  arduous  campaign  against  the  German 
Colony  on  the  south.  Some,  also,  in  the  early  days 
of  the  war  left  everything  and  went  back  to  England 
to  volunteer  in  Lord  Kitchener's  army.  As  in  South 
Africa,  the  colonial  problem  will  be  elsewhere  in  the 
British  Empire.  The  settlers  of  East  Africa  will 
undoubtedly  profit  by  the  privileges  that  Great 
Britain  will  be  forced  to  grant  to  her  colonials  all 
over  the  world. 


227 


CHAPTER  XII 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 
LTHOUGH  East  Africa  was  the  last  of  the  four 


German  colonies  in  Africa  to  receive  recogni- 


tion from  Berlin,  and  the  last  to  have  its 
definite  status  as  German  territory  assured,  it  has 
become  during  the  past  ten  years  by  far  the  most 
important  of  German  possessions,  and  stood,  in  1914, 
as  the  most  remarkable  achievement  in  the  world  of 
German  colonizers  and  German  merchants.  South- 
west Africa,  with  its  forbidding  harborless  coast  and 
its  poor  territory,  illustrates  the  indomitable  spirit 
of  men  who  made  the  very  best  of  the  worst  possible 
circumstances,  and  created  a  self-supporting  colony 
in  spite  of  adverse  political,  geographical,  economic, 
and  financial  conditions.  Togoland  and  Kamerun 
share  the  general  characteristics  of  other  Etiropean 
colonies  in  West  Africa.  Although  better  "organized" 
than  their  neighbors,  they  show  no  outstanding 
marks  of  superior  ability  or  superior  energy.  Then, 
too,  in  the  last  analysis,  they  share  the  handicap  of 
all  West  African  coast  colonies  of  a  climate  that 
makes  impossible  the  hope  of  a  white  man's  country. 

German  East  Africa  is  a  totally  different  proposi- 
tion.  Its  situation  is  admirable.   It  has  good  ports, 


228 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 


navigable  rivers,  and  mountain-lands.  The  climate 
is  suitable  for  white  colonization.  Agricultural  and 
mineral  resources  are  very  great,  and  not  difficult 
to  exploit.  The  colony  is  surrounded  by  rapidly 
developing  neighbors,  whose  prosperity  aids  the 
Germans  in  many  ways:  the  practicability  of  more 
frequent  steamship  service  on  the  coast  and  lakes; 
profitable  transit  trade  on  the  railway;  adjacent 
markets  for  local  and  metropolitan  trade,  developed 
by  German  merchants  settled  in  the  colony;  and 
emulation.  German  East  Africa  has  the  most 
advantageous  coast  Hne  of  African  colonies:  for 
there  is  an  inland  coast  as  well  as  a  seacoast.  On 
the  north,  half  of  Lake  Victoria  is  in  German  terri- 
tory. Almost  the  entire  western  botmdary  is  formed 
by  Lakes  Nyasa,  Tanganyika,  and  Kivu. 

The  colony  is  botmded  on  the  north  by  British 
East  Africa  and  Uganda,  on  the  west  by  Belgian 
Congo,  and  on  the  south  by  Rhodesia,  Nyasaland, 
and  Portuguese  East  Africa.  The  islands  of  Zanzi- 
bar and  Pemba,  off  the  northern  portion  of  the  coast, 
form  a  British  protectorate.  Mafia  Island,  off  the 
delta  of  the  Rufiji  River,  was  saved  by  the  Germans. 
A  conventional  line  from  the  mouth  of  the  Umba 
River  to  Lake  Victoria  forms  a  boundary  with  British 
East  Africa.  The  Uganda  boundary  is  also  a  con- 
ventional Une.  Lakes  Kivu  and  Tanganyika,  with 
the  river  between  them,  form  a  natural  boundary 
with  Belgium.  The  southern  boundary  with  Great 
Britain  is  the  mountain  range  running  from  Lake 
Tanganyika  to  Lake  Nyasa.  The  Rovuma  River 
forms  almost  the  entire  boundary  with  Portugal. 

229 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Some  distance  out  in  the  Mozambique  Channel,  off 
Cape  Delgado,  the  coast  boundary  with  Portugal, 
and  the  mouth  of  the  Rovuma  River,  lie  the  Comoro 
Islands,  belonging  to  France.  Considerably  farther 
out,  all  the  islands  (and  there  are  many  of  them) 
directly  east  of  German  East  Africa,  and  north  and 
northeast  of  Madagascar,  are  owned  and  occupied 
by  Great  Britain. 

Germany  owes  East  Africa  to  the  enterprise  of  the 
great  explorer,  Dr.  Peters,  who  founded  the  German 
Colonization  Society  in  1884,  against  the  advice  of, 
and  with  the  warning  of  no  support  from.  Prince 
Bismarck.  Late  in  1884,  Dr.  Peters  made  a  series  of 
treaties  with  the  Sultan  of  Zanzibar  for  the  posses- 
sion and  exploitation  of  the  moimtainous  territory 
back  from  the  Indian  Ocean  coast  between  the 
headwaters  of  the  Wami  and  Rufiji  rivers.  When  he 
returned  to  Berlin  in  February,  1885,  with  the  treaties 
in  his  pocket,  he  succeeded  in  getting  an  Imperial 
Charter.  The  German  East  Africa  Company  was 
formed.  During  the  next  three  years.  Dr.  Peters 
gradually  extended  his  privileges  and  territories  on 
the  Zanzibar  mainland  by  successive  agreements 
with  the  Sultan.  In  1888,  the  Sultan  leased  all  his 
mainland  territories,  south  of  the  Umba  River,  to  the 
German  East  Africa  Company  for  fifty  years,  under 
certain  stipulations.  When  the  East  Africa  Company 
tried  to  assume  the  control  of  the  country,  some  of 
the  local  authorities  refused  to  recognize  their 
Sultan's  treaty,  and  rebelled.  The  German  Govern- 
ment had  to  intervene.  In  1891,  the  Company  was 
in  full  control,  and,  during  the  last  decade  of  the 

230 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 


nineteenth  century,  developed  its  territories  along 
the  lines  of  similar  British  and  French  companies 
in  other  parts  of  Africa. 

The  rebellion,  however,  changed  radically  the 
political  status  of  the  Protectorate,  in  reference  to 
Zanzibar,  to  Germany,  and  to  the  world.  When  the 
British  saw  that  the  German  Government  was 
intervening  on  the  Indian  Ocean  coast,  they  invoked 
old  shadowy  rights  of  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  and  made  the  lessor  accept  a  protectorate. 
They,  in  turn,  leased  the  mainland  of  Zanzibar  north 
of  the  Umba  River.  At  the  same  time,  the  British 
claimed  a  protectorate  over  Uganda,  and  warned 
Germany  that  all  territory  north  of  Lake  Victoria 
Nyanza  was  in  the  British  sphere.  Germany,  in 
return,  was  recognized  as  owner  of  what  the  East 
Africa  Company  had  leased  from  Zanzibar,  and  of 
the  hinterland  back  to  the  lakes.  In  addition, 
Heligoland  was  ceded  to  Germany  as  "compensa- 
tion. "  At  the  time,  there  was  so  little  public  opinion 
in  Germany  favorable  to  an  aggressive  colonial  policy, 
that  only  Dr.  Peters  and  his  friends  felt  bitter  about 
being  shut  off  from  Central  Africa.  On  the  other 
hand,  British  statesmen  congratulated  themselves 
on  having  turned  a  clever  trick.  They  never  dreamed 
of  the  quarter  of  century  of  German  naval  expansion 
that  was  to  follow,  and  the  vital  importance  of 
HeHgoland  in  making  impregnable  the  German 
coast  line  and  home  naval  bases.' 

» Because  of  Heligoland,  Winston  Churchill's  boast  of  two  years 
ago,  that  the  British  would  go  into  German  ports  and  pull  the  Ger- 
mans out  of  their  holes  like  rats,  was  absurd. 

231 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  Treaty  of  1890,  however,  was  a  great  advan- 
tage to  the  British,  not  only  because  it  prevented 
German  colonial  expansion  in  Central  Africa,  and 
gave  them  the  coast  line  north  of  the  Umba  that  Dr. 
Peters  hoped  to  include  in  his  colony,  but  because 
the  control  of  Zanzibar  and  Pemba  prevented 
Germany  from  establishing  a  naval  base  at  Dar-es- 
Salaam  or  Pangani  or  on  the  coast  line  between  those 
two  ports.  Zanzibar  stands  to  German  East  Africa 
as  Walfisch  Bay  to  German  Southwest  Africa,  the 
mouth  of  the  Volta  and  Cape  St.  Paul  to  Togoland, 
and  the  Niger  delta  to  Kamerun,  an  everlasting 
command — thou  shalt  not  ! 

The  claim  of  partisan  writers  that  Germany 
acquired  her  African  colonies  by  trickery  and  bad 
faith  is  unfounded.  In  support  of  the  assertion  are 
cited  the  change  of  attitude  of  the  German  Govern- 
ment towards  Herr  Luderitz  in  Southwes.t  Africa 
and  Dr.  Peters  in  East  Africa  between  1884  and  1885, 
and  the  "conversion"  of  Bismarck.  We  are  told 
that  the  German  Government  all  along  was  behind 
these  two  men,  and  that  the  seeming  opposition  was 
a  blind  to  deceive  the  British  Foreign  Office.  The 
evidence  is  overwhelmingly  against  this  accusation. 
Not  only  in  1885,  but  right  along  for  almost  twenty 
years  after  that,  few  German  statesmen  were  favor- 
able to  colonies.  The  colonial  budget  was  a  constant 
embarrassment  to  the  Government  in  the  Reichstag. 
The  German  electorate  was  opposed  to  colonization. 
Not  until  1906  did  the  change  come.  Before  Dern- 
bcrg,  Germany  had  no  colonial  policy.  Her  acquisi- 
tions and  her  interferences  in  Africa,  Asia,  and 

232 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 


Oceania,  far  from  being  the  result  of  deep-laid 
Machiavellian  plots  against  the  peace  of  the  world, 
were  as  much  hit-and-miss,  as  hesitating  and  vacil- 
lating and  uncertain  of  popular  support,  as  the 
British  Imperial  program  before  1898.  I  do  not  at 
all  believe  that  Great  Britain  went  into  Egypt  in 
bad  faith,  and  that  her  repeated  assurances  about 
evacuating  Egypt,  frequently  given  to  the  Powers, 
were  a  wilful  deception.  I  think  that  the  statesmen 
who  told  the  Powers  so  positively  that  Great  Britain 
intended  to  evacuate  Egypt  meant  what  they  said. 
But  if  a  writer  went  at  the  Egypt  situation  between 
1884  and  1890  in  the  same  way  that  English  writers 
are  going  at  the  German  colonial  situation  during 
that  period,  he  could  build  up,  from  the  attitude  of 
British  Ministers  and  their  official  utterances,  as 
damning  an  indictment  of  Downing  Street  as  of 
Wilhelmstrasse. '  Both  Foreign  Offices  were  prob- 
ably innocent  of  intention  to  deceive,  and  were 
continually  embarrassed  and  perplexed  about  the 
way  events  forced  their  hand.  How  often  are  those 
who  get  the  credit  or  the  blame  for  events  as  sur- 
prised when  they  occur  as  are  outsiders!  None 
believes  them,  however,  and  they  have  to  take  the 
reputation  of  being  wise  or  sly  or  incapable. 

Instead  of  receiving  the  encouragement  and  the 
honors  they  would  have  had,  if  they  were  British 
pioneers  and  British  organizing  officials  in  British 

'  Able  French  writers,  in  fact,  have  done  this  very  thing.  Eng- 
land's honesty  of  purpose  in  Egyptian  diplomacy  has  been  accepted 
in  France  only  since  1904 — and  then,  not  bcaiuse  of  new  light  or  new 
facts  in  the  case! 

233 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


colonies,  Germans  who  had  to  do  with  the  foundation 
and  early  development  of  East  Africa  were  treated 
with  signal  ingratitude.  In  England,  Stanley  was 
rewarded  with  a  knighthood  and  election  to  Parlia- 
ment; in  Germany,  Dr.  Peters  was  slandered  and 
discredited.  In  British  East  Africa,  Uganda,  and  the 
Sudan,  the  British  Government  helped  the  local 
officials  in  every  way  possible,  and  Parliament  never 
turned  a  deaf  ear  to  railway  projects  essential  for  the 
pacification  and  economic  development  of  these 
colonies.  The  Colonial  Loans  Act,  passed  in  1899 
right  in  the  midst  of  the  Boer  War,  of  which  we  have 
spoken  elsewhere,  has  been  of  great  aid  to  British 
colonies  during  the  period  of  our  survey.  There  was 
nothing  similar  in  Germany.  The  Reichstag  dis- 
couraged East  African  development  by  throwing  out 
budget  appropriations,  while  the  Ugarida  Railway  was 
being  built  directly  north  oj  the  German  colony  from  the 
coast  at  Mombasa  to  Lake  Victoria!  When  one  reads 
through  the  Reichstag  proceedings  during  the  first 
six  years  of  the  twentieth  century,  he  marvels  at  the 
optimism  and  courage  of  the  officials  who  "held  on" 
in  East  Africa.  They  were  denied  the  funds  for  rail- 
way construction.  The  rival  British  colony  was 
getting,  because  of  its  railway,  not  only  Belgian 
trade,  but  also  German  hinterland  trade.  In  spite 
of  all  this  discouragement  during  the  years  from  1900 
to  1906,  trade  more  than  doubled  in  the  German 
Protectorate. 

The  railway  across  British  East  Africa  was 
completed  soon  after  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth 
century.    The  Germans  interested  in  colonial  de- 

234 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 

velopment  knew  how  important  it  was  not  to  allow 
the  rivals  on  the  north  to  get  too  far  ahead  of  them 
in  estabhshing  their  trade  in  Central  Africa.  They 
tried  their  very  best,  by  conferences,  newspaper  and 
magazine  articles,  public  meetings,  and  Reichstag 
and  Bundesrath  discussions  to  get  public  interest  in, 
and  public  money  for,  white  colonization  and  railway 
extension  in  East  Africa.  The  former  could  not 
come  without  the  latter.  Railways  were  essential 
for  pacification  and  administrative  organization  of 
the  interior.  After  the  completion  of  the  British 
Uganda  Railway,  a  small — very  small — beginning 
was  made.  A  private  company  had  started  in  1896 
a  railway  from  Tanga,  opposite  Pemba  Island,  along 
the  Pangani  River  valley  into  the  mountainous 
Usambara  cotmtry.  Half  way  from  Tanga  to  the 
river  it  was  stopped  for  lack  of  funds.  In  1902,  the 
Government  took  over  the  line,  and  pushed  it  forward 
to  Korogwe  on  the  river.  In  1904,  it  reached  Mombo. 
In  the  central  part  of  the  Protectorate,  the  route 
from  Lake  Tanganyika  to  the  coast  was  served  by 
slow,  expensive  caravan  transport  to  Bagamoyo  oppo- 
site Zanzibar  Island.  Porters  carried  on  their  backs 
the  ivory,  rubber,  and  other  hinterland  products 
to  the  sea,  and  returned  inland  with  the  imports  in 
the  same  way.  In  1896,  when  the  line  from  Tanga 
was  started,  a  railway  inland  from  Dar-es-Salaam 
was  projected  also.  Nothing  was  accomplished.  In 
1900,  when  the  Uganda  Railway  was  triumphantly 
progressing  inland,  the  Reichstag  refused  to  vote 
twenty-five  thousand  dollars  for  a  survey  of  the  first 
section  of  a  transcolonial  railway  in  East  Africa!  In 

235 


THE  NEW  :^IAP  OF  AFRICA 


1904,  the  Deutsche  Bank  got  a  concession  for  a  single 
track  from  Dar-es-Salaam  to  Mrogoro.  Work  was 
begun  in  1905. 

The  dissolution  of  the  Reichstag,  in  1906,  referred 
the  question  of  colonial  policy  to  the  countr}%  The 
general  election  was  a  victor}'  for  Imperialism.  A 
completely  new  era  commenced  for  German  East 
Africa  and  all  the  other  colonies.  The  Reichstag 
began  to  cooperate  with  Dr.  Demberg  and  the  new 
IMinistry  of  Colonies.  Generous  imperial  grants  were 
voted,  and  railway  construction  b}'  Government 
initiative  and  b}'  Government  expense  was  started. 

In  December,  1907,  train  service  was  initiated 
from  Dar-es-Salaam  to  Mrogoro.  The  next  stage 
was  to  Kilossa,  which  rapidly  became  the  great 
inland  city  of  the  colony.  In  six  3'ears  the  remark- 
able feat  was  accomplished  of  continuing  the  railway 
directly  across  German  East  Africa  to  Lake  Tan- 
ganyika. It  reached  the  lake  port  terminus  at 
Kigoma  in  191 3.  Immediately  the  German  railway 
became  the  shortest  and  best  route  from  Belgian 
territory  to  the  coast.  The  upper  valley  of  the 
Congo,  the  extreme  northern  part  of  Rhodesia,  and 
even  portions  of  Xyasaland  and  Uganda  Protec- 
torates, found  in  the  German  line  the  best  outlet 
for  their  trade.  Economic  conditions  in  the  Central 
African  lake  coimtr}'-  were  completely  changed.  No 
single  engineering  feat  in  African  histor}'  has  been 
wrought  in  so  short  a  time  and  brought  so  important 
results.  During  the  same  period  the  ocean  terminus 
of  the  railway,  Dar-es-Salaam,  has  been  transformed 
from  a  negro  village,  in  whose  suburbs  Hons  prowled, 

236 


THE  GERAL^^S  IX  EAST  AFRICA 


to  a  "clean  and  imposing  residential  town,  laid  out 
with  handsome  squares  and  avenues,  and  furnished 
with  substantial  churches,  hotels,  and  public  build- 
ings, and  neat,  white  tropical  houses.  The  'harbor  of 
peace'  still  shelters  native  craft,  but  majestic  liners 
now  ride  on  its  weU-sheltered  waters."' 

Before  the  construction  of  the  railway — they  covdd 
not  wait  for  that — the  administrative  organization 
of  the  colony  was  started  by  the  authorities  on  an 
extensive  scale.  After  each  punitive  expedition, 
military  posts  were  estabhshed.  Following  the 
remarkably  successful  example  of  the  Italians  in 
Somaliland,  wireless  telegraphy  was  included  in  the 
scheme  of  miHtary  operations  almost  from  the 
beginning  of  the  placing  of  upland  posts.  In  1903,  a 
departure  was  made  from  the  custom  of  other  Ger- 
man colonies,  which  levied  a  head  tax,  and  the  hut 
tax,  so  satisfactory  in  some  British  colonies,  was 
adopted.  The  Germans  were  continually  studying 
the  results  obtained  by  British  and  French  adminis- 
trators. The  reports  of  German  consuls  and  special 
commissioners  all  over  the  world  included  their 
section  for  the  Colonial  Ministry.  Since  1906,  a 
larger  budget  has  made  it  possible  for  Berlin  to 
receive  information  concerning  the  administration  of 
rival  colonies  fully  as  complete  as  that  which  had 
long  been  received  concerning  their  trade.  The 

'  See  Calvert's  German  African  Empire  (London,  1916),  p.  196,  to 

which  I  gratefully  acknowledge  my  indebtedness  for  the  fullest  and 
most  illuminating  account  available  in  English  of  what  the  Germans 
have  accomplished  in  Africa.  The  maps  in  this  volume,  and  its 
careful  statistics,  are  as  valuable  as  Mr.  Calvert's  text. 

237 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Germans,  like  the  Japanese,  owe  much  to  the  fact 
that  they  are  the  best  students  in  the  world  of  what 
others  in  the  world  are  doing. 

There  has  been,  however,  the  handicap  in  East 
Africa  as  elsewhere  of  a  too  rigid  bureaucracy,  and 
the  unfortunate  Teutonic  disregard  of  the  rights  of 
others  when  they  come  into  conflict  with  Teutonic 
rights — or  what  are  believed  to  be  Teutonic  rights. 
German  missionaries  had  the  same  experience  as  in 
China.  A  bishop  was  murdered  in  the  south- 
eastern part  of  the  Protectorate,  near  Lake  Nyasa, 
in\  1905,  and  several  of  his  colleagues  suffered  the 
same  fate.  There  can  be  no  doubt  of  the  truth  of 
the  charge  that  German  missionaries,  like  Belgian 
missionaries  in  the  Congo,  exacted  unpaid  labor  of 
natives,  and  that  the  system  of  entrusting  adminis- 
trative districts  to  low  caste  native  officials  resulted 
in  unjust  exploitation  and  persecution.  Until  the 
Germans  can  recruit  for  colonial  service  a  better 
type  of  men  than  they  have  had,  German  colonies 
will  not  be  administered  as  well  and  as  justly  from 
the  point  of  view  of  the  natives,  as  British  Crown 
colonies,  which  are  the  model  and  admiration  of  the 
world. 

A  curious  speech  of  Prince  Hohenlohe  to  the 
Reichstag  in  March,  1906,  showed  the  difference 
between  German  and  British  ideas  of  treating 
Mohammedanism.  He  explained  that  there  was  a 
broad  distinction  between  the  advantageous  culti- 
vation of  friendly  relations  with  Mohammedan 
foreign  powers  and  the  attitude  the  German  Govern- 
ment should  adopt  toward  its  own  Moslem  subjects. 

238 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 


In  the  one  case,  German  policy  was  dictated  by 
"the  necessities  of  the  general  international  situa- 
tion." In  the  other  case,  it  was  the  duty  of  the 
Government  to  promote  the  spread  of  Christianity 
in  the  German  colonies.  If  favor  was  being  shown  to 
Mohammedans  in  Government  schools  in  German 
East  Africa,  and  if  Moslems  were  selected  for  petty 
posts  in  preference  to  native  Christians,  it  was 
because  they  had  to  accustom  the  natives  to  a 
Christian  atmosphere  before  attempting  to  teach 
them  Christian  doctrine.  Nothing  could  be  more 
reprehensible  and  more  pernicious  than  such  ideas. 
Proselytizing  is  not  a  Government's  business:  but  if 
it  is  undertaken,  it  should  be  undertaken  openly. 
Moslems  are  too  clever  to  be  fooled.  Being  mission- 
ary enthusiasts  and  propagandists  themselves,  they 
respect  the  man  who  tries  openly  to  convert  them. 
He  is  doing  only  what  they  themselves  would  do,  and 
they  tmderstand  his  motive.  They  see  without 
difficulty  through  the  dissimulation  of  indirect 
methods,  and  they  despise  the  dissimulator — all  the 
more  so  because  he  has  made  religious  zeal  the  excuse 
of  his  hypocrisy. '  No  German  needs  to  wonder  why 

'  As  far  as  the  eastern  end  of  the  Mediterranean  goes,  the  French 
have  made  a  fatal  poHtical  mistake  in  laying  emphasis  upon  their 
traditional  position  as  defenders  of  the  Catholic  Church.  In  Turkey 
and  the  Balkans,  Moslems  of  very  mediocre  knowledge  of  the  world 
know  that  France  ten  years  ago  drove  the  religious  orders  out  of  the 
country  and  confiscated  their  property,  and  yet  in  Moslem  countries 
was  granting  at  the  same  time  large  sums  for  the  schools  and  religious 
propaganda  of  these  very  orders,  and  jealously  defended  thcnr 
property  rights  even  from  fancied  infringements.  Books  like 
Psichari's  recent  posthumous  Voyage  du  Centurion,  in  which  the 

239 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Islam  has  not  followed  the  Turks  in  the  present  war. 
Arab  Moslems  are  at  heart  enemies  of  all  ghiaours 
(infidels).  But,  from  personal  and  frank  intercourse 
with  them,  in  several  countries,  I  have  found  that 
the  Englishman  is  the  only  ghiaour  they  trust. 
They  like  the  Frenchman  better  than  the  English- 
man. But  they  do  not  trust  him.  The  German  they 
neither  like  nor  trust — except  where  they  have  never 
come  into  contact  with  him  and  know  nothing  about 
him.    Why  should  they? 

In  1908,  after  a  visit  to  East  Africa,  Dr.  Demberg 
said  that  he  had  found  the  condition  of  the  natives 
unsatisfactory,  and  the  judicial  system  imfavorable 
to  them.  There  were  too  many  officials  on  the  coast, 
and  too  few  in  the  interior.  He  was  opposed  to  the 
encouragement  at  present  of  European  immigration, 
but  he  had  sent  an  Under  Secretary  to  study  the 
capabilities  of  the  highlands  for  white  settlement,  as 
was  being  done  in  British  East  Africa.  He  returned 
with  the  firm  conviction  that  it  would  be  bad  policy 
to  restrict  Indian  immigration.  The  Indians  were 
indispensable  to  the  Government  in  many  ways,  and 
were  an  essential  part  of  the  economic  life  of  the 

French  soldiers  in  Northern  Africa  are  represented  as  being  each  "a 
Christopher,  carrying  Christ,"  show  that  Prince  Hohenlohe's  views 
are  not  without  sponsors  in  France.  Among  Englishmen,  also, 
"Chinese"  Gordon  has  not  been  the  only  colonial  official  who  be- 
lieved he  had  a  proselytizing  mission.  A  very  recent  example  is 
General  Sir  Ian  Hamilton,  whose  proclamation  to  the  Turks  assured 
them  that  the  English  were  not  coming  to  Turkey  with  any  intention 
to  destroy  their  independence  or  religion,  and  whose  speech  to  his 
troops  on  the  following  day,  when  they  were  disembarking  at  Galli- 
poli,  ended  with  the  words,  "You  arc  starting  upon  the  last  Crusade!" 

240 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 


country.  This  was  in  contradiction  to  the  view 
expressed  by  the  German  Colonial  Society's  Congress 
the  year  before.  The  Congress  had  recommended 
that  the  authorities  issue  regtdations  and  adopt 
measures  with  a  view  to  the  better  protection  of  small 
German  traders  and  settlers  against  Indian  mer- 
chants, and  suggested  restrictions  similar  to  those  in 
South  Africa.  There  were  nearly  fifteen  thousand 
Asiatics  in  the  colony  at  the  outbreak  of  the  European 
War.  The  European  settlers  had  passed  the  five 
thousand  mark,  and  over  four  thousand  of  them 
were  native-bom  Germans. 

In  the  ten  years  from  1903  to  1913,  the  trade  of 
German  East  Africa  increased  five  hundred  per  cent. 
In  19 12,  it  had  reached  over  twenty  million  dollars, 
and  jimiped  two  and  a  half  million  dollars  upward  in 
1 9 13.  In  spite  of  extensive  pubUc  works,  the  budget 
did  not  show  a  large  deficit. 

Contrary  to  what  has  been  frequently  asserted 
during  these  past  two  years,  public  opinion  in  Ger- 
many, as  we  have  already  seen  in  the  matter  of  the 
putting  down  of  the  Herero  rebellion  in  Southwest 
Africa,  has  been  very  much  alive  to  the  responsibility 
of  Germany  toward  her  native  wards.  One  has  only 
to  read  the  newspapers  and  reviews,  and  to  look 
over  book  lists,  and  to  go  through  parliamentary 
debates  during  the  past  fifteen  years,  to  realize  that 
only  in  Great  Britain,  among  all  the  European 
colonizing  Powers,  has  there  been  manifested  as 
much  humanitarianism  and  idealism  as  in  Germany 
with  regard  to  the  establishment  and  maintenance 
of  a  just  and  enlightened  colonial  regime.  At  this 
16  241 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


moment,  it  is  exceedingly  important  that  this  state- 
ment be  made  by  one  who  cannot  be  suspected  of 
sympathizing  with  Germany  in  the  present  war  or  of 
tr^'ing  to  plead  the  German  cause.  The  truth  is  the 
truth.  Only  on  the  truth  can  the  future  be  built. 
In  France,  in  Belgium,  in  Portugal,  in  Italy,  in 
Russia  one  looks  in  vain  to  find  so  widespread  and 
so  important  a  championing  of  the  cause  of  native 
races  as  one  finds  in  Germany. 

In  the  early  part  of  1914,  the  Reichstag  passed  a 
resolution  asking  for  the  aboHtion  of  serfdom  in  East 
Africa  before  January  i,  1920.  A  Government  white 
paper  pointed  out  that  it  would  be  dangerous  to  fix 
a  date  for  abolition.  But  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war 
German  public  opinion  was  still  demanding  that  this 
date  be  fixed.  In  East  Africa,  Germany  had  been 
deaHng  with  the  slavery  question  very  much  as 
Great  Britain  dealt  with  it  in  Zanzibar.  It  was 
enacted  in  1905  that  no  native  could  be  bom  in 
slavery  after  that  year,  and  that  slaves  could  pur- 
chase their  freedom  for  a  small  sum,  which  masters 
are  not  allowed  to  prevent  them  from  earning.  In 
eight  years  nearly  twenty  thousand  had  emancipated 
themselves  by  their  own  efforts.  It  was  estimated 
that  only  eighty-five  thousand  were  left,  and  that  in 
fifteen  years  slavery  would  disappear  entirely.  The 
white  paper  used  practically  the  same  arguments  as 
those  of  the  British  authorities  in  Zanzibar  against 
the  hastening  of  the  emancipation  process  by  fixing 
an  arbitrary  date,  while  there  were  still  many  old 
slaves  alive.  For  these  would  be  left  without  means 
of  existence. 

242 


THE  GERMANS  IN  EAST  AFRICA 


To  mark  the  thirtieth  anniversary  of  the  colony, 
an  exhibition  was  being  prepared  for  August,  19 14, 
at  Dar-es-Salaam.  When  August  arrived,  the  Ger- 
mans in  East  Africa  were  cut  off  from  the  rest  of  the 
world.  Left  to  their  own  resources,  they  managed 
to  carry  on  a  resistance  that  is  just  drawing  to  a  close 
when  these  lines  are  being  written  in  October,  19 16. 


243. 


CHAPTER  XIII 


THE    PROBLEM    OF    THE  PORTUGUESE 
COLONIES 

IN  the  fourteenth  century,  one  hundred  years 
before  a  united  monarchy  ruled  over  Spain, 
dislike  and  fear  of  the  Spaniards  led  Portugal 
to  seek  foreign  aid  to  prevent  absorption  in  the 
unification  of  the  Iberian  Peninsula.  There  were 
later  treaties  with  Charles  I.,  Cromwell,  and  Charles 
II.  The  infeodation  of  Portugal  to  England  was 
completed  by  the  Methuen  Treaty,  signed  shortly 
after  the  outbreak  of  the  War  of  the  Spanish  Suc- 
cession. For  over  two  hundred  years  Britain  has 
held  the  Portuguese  in  a  state  of  complete  vassalage. 
She  used  the  Portuguese  against  Spain  and  against 
France  to  break  their  sea  power  and  their  budding 
colonial  empires.  Now  Germany  is  having  the  same 
experience. 

The  Anglo-Portuguese  Treaty  of  1703  put  Portugal 
in  economic  as  well  as  political  dependence  upon 
England.  During  two  hundred  years  this  dependence 
was  contested  only  by  Napoleon.  At  the  end  of 
the  nineteenth  century  the  British  began  to  feel 
anew  the  danger  of  a  change  in  the  comfortable 
status  quo  they  enjoyed  in  regard  to  Portugal.  Ger- 

244 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


many  loomed  up  as  a  successful  economic  rival. 
Her  representatives  started  to  "intrigue"  at  Lisbon. 
The  reason  for  Germany's  interest  was  the  valuable 
Portuguese  colonial  empire,  which  financial  difficul- 
ties and  political  decadence  made  Portugal  incapable 
of  exploiting.  Spain  saw  the  disappearance  of  her 
colonial  empire  in  the  war  of  1898  with  the  United 
States.  Could  Portugal  hope  to  hold  much  longer 
her  overseas  possessions? 

When  Germany  entered  Africa  her  two  great 
southern  colonies  became  neighbors  of  Portugal. 
She  installed  herself  on  the  coast  of  the  Atlantic 
south  of  Portuguese  West  Africa,  and  on  the  coast  of 
the  Indian  Ocean  north  of  Portuguese  East  Africa. 
In  1887,  a  treaty  was  signed  delimiting  the  Germano- 
Portuguese  frontiers  on  the  Indian  Ocean  side  of  the 
continent,  which  was  immediately  followed  by  an 
extension  of  commercial  interests  in  Portugal  and 
in  the  Portuguese  colonies. 

It  was  an  advantageous  moment  for  Germany. 
The  British  penetration  north  from  the  Cape  towards 
the  center  of  Africa  brought  Great  Britain  and 
Portugal  into  conflict.  Portugal,  relying  upon  the 
general  interpretation  as  to  hinterland  possessions 
agreed  upon  in  the  international  conferences  about 
African  spheres  of  influence,  believed  that  she  had 
the  right  to  the  interior  of  Africa  between  her  colonies 
on  the  Atlantic  and  the  Indian  Ocean.  But  the 
British  won  over  native  chiefs  in  Nyasaland  and 
along  the  Zambesi  valley.  An  ultimatum  was 
presented  to  Portugal  in  1890.  The  oldest  colonizer 
of  Africa  had  to  bow  to  force.    On  June  11,  1891,  a 

245 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


treaty  was  signed  which  destroyed  forever  the  hopes 
of  Portugal  to  a  transcontinental  African  colony, 
just  as  the  same  argument  of  force,  applied  eight 
years  later  to  France,  destroyed  forever  similar  hopes 
of  French  Imperialists  in  North  Africa.  I  do  not 
mean  to  imply  that  the  British  were  acting  towards 
Portugal  and  towards  France  in  an  indefensible 
manner.  The  enterprise  of  British  explorers  and 
the  energy  and  ability  of  British  military  and  civil 
officials  to  profit  by  the  principle  of  carpe  diem 
brought  the  reward  which  is  "the  way  of  the  world. " 
But,  as  is  also  "the  way  of  the  world,"  the  final 
and  convincing  argument  applied  both  to  Portugal 
and  France  in  Africa  was  superior  force.  Yet  that 
the  Lisbon  and  Fashoda  ultimatums  did  not  alienate 
Portugal  and  France  definitely  from  Great  Britain  is 
a  tribute  not  only  to  British  diplomacy  but  also  to 
the  confidence  born  of  experience  in  Anglo-Saxon 
fair  dealing — once  Anglo-Saxon  pretensions  are  ac- 
knowledged and  claims  admitted. 

The  last  years  of  the  nineteenth  century  were 
marked  by  an  event  which,  in  the  light  of  present 
events,  might  have  been  a  turning-point  in  history. 
Chamberlain,  Rhodes,  and  other  British  Imperialists 
of  the  early  days  were  firm  believers  in  the  necessity 
of  building  the  future  of  Great  Britain,  especially 
in  Africa,  upon  the  foundation  of  an  understanding 
with  Germany.  Rhodes  saw  peace  and  prosperity 
for  Great  Britain,  and  the  realization  of  his  dreams  in 
Africa,  only  in  harmony  between  the  two  great  Teutonic 
races  of  Europe,  which  was  to  he  shared  with  Anglo- 
Saxon  countries  overseas,  the  United  States,  Canada^ 

246 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


and  Australia.  His  South  African  empire  was  to 
cooperate  with  German  Southwest  Africa  and 
German  East  Africa.  If  Portugal  could  be  made  to 
develop  her  African  heritage  herself,  Great  Britain 
and  Germany  were  to  stand  behind  her  and  help  her. 
If  Portugal  proved  hopelessly  beyond  reform,  Great 
Britain  and  Germany  should  divide  the  Portuguese 
colonies. 

Mr.  Rhodes  visited  Berlin,  and  talked  over  with 
the  Germans  his  plans  of  railway  expansion  in  South 
and  Central  Africa.  He  secured  Germany's  consent 
to  join  in  railway  schemes  that  would  bind  the 
system  he  had  in  mind  for  British  penetration  in  the 
interior  with  outlets  through  German  and  Portuguese 
territories  to  the  coast.  Mr.  Chamberlain  signed 
a  treaty  with  Germany  in  1898,  providing  for  an 
eventual  partition  of  the  Portuguese  colonies  between 
Germany  and  Great  Britain.  This  treaty  has  never 
been  published:  but  it  was  not  officially  denied  at 
the  time,  nor  has  it  been  since.  Germany  was  to 
have  the  Portuguese  possessions  in  Asia;  East 
Africa  south  to  the  junction  of  the  Zambesi  and 
Shir6  rivers;  and  West  Africa  north  to  Cape  Santa 
Maria,  including  the  whole  of  Mossamedes.  Great 
Britain  was  to  cede  Walfisch  Bay  to  Germany,  and 
receive  the  rest  of  Portugal's  African  possessions. 
According  to  British  explanation,  semi-officially 
made  after  the  secret  leaked  out,  the  two  Powers 
had  no  intention  of  buying  or  seizing  the  Portu- 
guese colonies  or  of  impairing  the  legitimate 
sovereignty  of  Portugal.  They  were  simply  ar- 
ranging "economic  spheres" — something  like  the 

247 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


later  Russian  and  British  spheres  in  Persia,  I  sup- 
pose ! ' 

The  Boer  War  and  the  accession  of  Edward  VII. 
brought  a  change  in  Anglo-German  relations.  Ger- 
man industry,  German  commerce,  and  the  German 
naval  program  alienated  British  opinion  from  the 
policy  of  Rhodes  and  Chamberlain.  Germany 
and  Great  Britain  drifted  apart.  In  1904  came 
the  agreement  with  France.  In  1907,  the  agree- 
ment with  Russia  made  it  clear  that  Great  Britain  had 
thrown  in  her  lot  with  Germany's  enemies.  But 
the  will  of  Cecil  Rhodes  stands  as  the  record  of  what 
he  believed  was  the  hope  of  the  future  of  Anglo- 
Saxondom  and  the  basis  of  peace  for  the  world  in  the 
twentieth  century.  He  expressed  the  hope  that  his 
countrymen  would  cultivate  the  friendship  of  Ger- 
many in  the  most  unmistakable  terms.  He  felt 
deeply  the  necessity  of  Anglo-Saxon  solidarity.  He 
left  money  to  enable  Americans  and  Germans  to 
study  at  Oxford,  in  the  "impHcit  belief  that  a  good 
understanding  between  England  and  the  United 
States  of  America  and  Germany  would  sectire  the 

'  See  Berlin  Lokalanzeiger,  December  28,  1899,  and  London 
newspapers  passim,  during  January,  1900.  C/.  A.  Marvaud,  Le 
Portugal  el  ses  Colonies  (Alcan,  Paris,  1912),  p.  58.  "II  est  difficile 
de  pousser  plus  loin  I'hypocrisie, "  writes  M.  Marvaud.  I  gratefully 
acknowledge  my  indebtedness  to  this  illuminating  volume,  a  careful 
economic  study  of  the  Portuguese  colonies,  which  has  helped  me 
greatly.  Most  of  this  chapter,  however,  and  especially  what  is 
said  of  the  rivalry  between  Germany  and  Great  Britain  and  the 
effect  of  the  problem  of  the  Portuguese  colonies  on  their  foreign  policy, 
is  taken  verhatim  from  an  article  I  wrote  in  Constantinople  two  years 
before  the  appearance  of  M.  Marvaud's  book  and  four  years  before 
the  war. 

248 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


peace  of  the  world  and  that  educational  relations 
form  the  strongest  tie." 

Events  may  not  have  proved  that  Cecil  Rhodes 
was  right:  but  they  have  yet  to  prove  that  he  was 
wrong. 

As  elsewhere  in  the  world,  and  especially  in  Africa, 
the  increase  of  German  trade  and  the  multipHcation 
of  German  enterprises  has  been  especially  marked  in 
Portugal  and  the  Portuguese  colonies  since  1900. 
German  imports  to  Portugal  more  than  doubled 
between  1900  and  19 10,  and  the  German  carrying 
trade  was  threatening  to  displace  that  of  Great 
Britain  in  1913.  Germany's  increase,  proportion- 
ately, was  far  greater  than  that  of  any  other  nation, 
both  in  trade  and  shipping.  In  the  Portuguese  col- 
onies the  figures  are  eloquent.  In  spite  of  vexatious 
tariff  discrimination  and  port  regulations,  German 
ships  were  bringing  each  year  a  notable  increase 
of  German  goods  to  Portuguese  colonies  in  Africa 
and  were  taking  the  exports  to  Hamburg,  very  often 
to  be  resold  and  reshipped  there  in  German  bottoms 
to  the  very  country  which  owned  the  colonies!' 

The  alarm  that  has  been  felt  in  recent  years  by  the 
British  over  the  possibility  of  Germany  getting 
a  foothold  for  coaUng  stations  and  naval  bases 
in  the  Portuguese  colonies  is  illustrated  by  the 
sanatoriums  incident  in  Madeira.  In  April,  1903,  a 
German  artillery  officer,  who  had  gone  to  Funchal 
for  his  health,  secured  a  concession  for  sanatoriums 
and  hotels  for  invaHds.  He  had  formed  a  company 
and  the  terms  of  the  concession  allowed  gambHng. 

'  See  below,  p. 

249 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  London  press  immediately  took  up  the  matter 
and  declared  that  Germany  was  trying  to  "invade" 
Madeira.  They  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  the 
island  was  "only  some  hours  distant  from  Gibraltar, " 
that  the  Germans  would  expel  English  merchants, 
create  a  "diplomatic  incident,"  and  end  up  by 
installing  themselves  in  the  Portuguese  islands. 
The  British  Minister  at  Lisbon  was  instructed  to 
declare  to  the  Portuguese  Government  that  Great 
Britain  would  not  permit  the  German  company  to 
acquire  any  privilege  to  the  detriment  of  British 
subjects.  The  German  concession  had  in  it  a  clause 
allowing  expropriation.  When  the  Germans  tried  to 
expropriate  a  property  belonging  to  an  Englishman, 
the  crisis  became  acute. 

The  Portuguese  Government  was  not  allowed  to 
refer  the  matter  to  the  Hague  Tribunal,  or  even  to 
offer  the  Sanatoriums  Company  another  property  in 
exchange  for  the  one  they  desired  to  expropriate. 
Great  Britain  insisted  on  the  concession  being 
cancelled.  For  years  the  matter  hung  fire:  the  Ger- 
man company  demanded  a  large  indemnity.  Later, 
a  new  company,  almost  entirely  English  in  its  stock- 
holders, applied  at  Lisbon  for  the  gambling  conces- 
sion, with  the  intention  of  working  along  the  German 
lines.  In  1909,  there  was  again  a  great  campaign  in 
the  London  press  over  German  "intrigues"  at  Lisbon. 
It  was  claimed  that  Germany  was  trying  to  buy  some 
small  islands  off  the  Portuguese  coast,  and  that 
Germans  were  being  given  privileges  at  Lorenzo 
Marques. 

British  public  opinion  has  always  been  unalter- 

250 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


ably  opposed  to  transfers  of  territory  anywhere  in 
the  world  that  might  affect  her  position  as  "mistress 
of  the  seas."  To  maintain  her  world  supremacy, 
Great  Britain  is  always  willing  to  fight.  That  is 
reasonable.  One  likes  to  keep  what  one  has,  and  to 
prevent  others  from  changing  the  status  quo.  The 
historian  has  no  quarrel  with  the  frank  expression 
of  this  determination.  But  he  has  a  quarrel  with  the 
strange  and  altogether  untenable  idea  that  other 
nations  are  "faithless"  and  guilty  of  "treachery" 
and  "brutality"  and  "disturbing  the  world's  peace," 
who  try  to  carve  out  for  themselves  a  place  in  the 
world  by  following  the  same  path  of  acqmsition  along 
which  Britain  and  her  predecessors  in  world  empire 
have  intrigued  and  bluffed  and  fought  their  way. 
Denying  that  the  past  has  any  effect  on  the  present 
is  as  illogical  as  it  is  pernicious.  We  cannot  be 
surprised  at  and  denounce  and  try  to  remedy  ef- 
fects unless  we  make  a  sincere  and  detached  study  of 
causes. 

The  Madeira  and  Azores  islands  are  an  integral 
part  of  Portugal.  Since  Spain  lost  her  colonies,  the 
Portuguese  colonial  possessions  in  Africa  and  Asia 
are,  in  extent  of  territory,  larger  than  those  of  any 
country  in  the  world,  except  Great  Britain,  France, 
and  Germany.  They  have  not,  however,  as  large 
a  population  as  the  colonies  of  Holland.  Aside  from 
a  foothold  in  China  at  Macao,  and  small  bits  of  terri- 
tory in  India  and  the  Malay  Archipelago,  which 
mean  little  more  than  the  memory  of  ancient  glory,  * 

■  To  a  Power  like  Germany,  which  has  so  few  footholds  in  the 
world,  Goa,  Damao,  Diu,  Macao,  and  Timor  might  prove  of  value 

251 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Portugal  as  a  colonial  Power  has  her  interests  in 
Africa,  and  is  important  only  in  Africa. 

Portuguese  colonies  in  Africa  consist  of  the  Cape 
Verde  Islands,  a  group  in  the  Atlantic  off  the  western 
shores  of  the  continent,  where  its  bend  is  most 
accentuated;  Guinea,  an  enclave,  wholly  surrounded 
by  French  West  African  territories;  Sao  Thome  and 
Principe,  two  islands  in  the  Gulf  of  Guinea;  Portu- 
guese West  Africa  (Angola),  from  the  mouth  of  the 
Congo  south  to  German  Southwest  Africa;  and 
Portuguese  East  Africa  from  Cape  Delgado,  bound- 
ary with  German  East  Africa,  south  to  Delagoa 
Bay,  which  cuts  off  the  Transvaal  from  the  sea,  and  is 
just  north  of  Natal.  These  colonies  cover  nearly 
eight  hundred  thousand  square  miles,  and  have  a 
population  of  over  eight  millions. 

There  are  foiirteen  islands,  some  very  small,  in 
the  Cape  Verde  group.  As  they  are  on  the  route 
from  Europe  to  South  America,  and  command  the 
coastal  passage  around  Africa,  their  situation  is  of 
unusual  importance.  The  cables  to  Brazil  and  to 
South  Africa  touch  St.  Vincent,  and  also  the  line  to 
Bathurst,  in  British  Gambia.  In  the  hands  of  a 
Power  Uke  Germany,  these  islands  could  easily 
become  an  incomparable  naval  base,  coaling  station, 
and  wireless  telegraphy  center.  To  Portugal  they 
have  no  value.  The  Portuguese  have  not  been  able 
to  develop  them  in  the  interest  of  their  inhabitants : 
nor  have  they  made  use  of  the  advantage  that  the 

as  naval,  coaling,  and  wireless  stations.  To  Great  Britain  or  France, 
who  have  many  ports  and  islands  in  the  same  waters,  they  would  be 
of  no  value,  except  to  keep  out  someone  else. 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 

route  to  South  America  passes  between  the  two  north- 
ern islands  of  the  group,  St.  Anthony  and  St.  Vincent. 
Agriculture  is  in  a  deplorable  state.  The  inhabi- 
tants have  not  even  been  taught  to  use  plows.  They 
have  been  allowed  to  destroy  the  trees  of  the  islands 
by  unchecked  goat  pasturage.  The  natives  are  in 
a  state  of  distressing  degradation.  An  enterprising 
nation  would  not  only  make  the  islands  pay  by  their 
cultivation,  and  Hft  the  inhabitants  to  the  level  of 
European  civiHzation;  but  would  also  profit  by  the 
situation  on  the  trade  routes  to  establish  coaling 
and  provision  depots  and  dry  docks.  The  lamentable 
state  of  civilization  in  the  Cape  Verde  Islands  is  a 
striking  proof  of  Portugal's  inability  to  discharge  the 
duties  of  her  stewardship. 

Guinea  tells  the  same  sad  story.  It  is  traversed 
by  three  deep  rivers,  and  off  its  coast  are  numerous 
islands.  The  possibiHties  of  a  strong  fortified  harbor 
and  of  developing  a  splendid  trade  with  the  interior 
are  greater  in  Guinea  than  in  the  neighboring  posses- 
sions of  France  and  Great  Britain.  What  Senegal 
and  French  Guinea  and  Gambia  and  Sierra  Leone 
are,  is  the  strongest  possible  indictment  of  Portugal 
as  a  colonial  power.  The  colony  has  fertile  soil,  rich 
forests,  tmrivaled  means  of  communication  by  water 
with  the  interior,  and  the  protection  of  a  compact 
group  of  islands  just  off  the  coast.  Where  France 
and  Great  Britain  have  wrought  miracles  in  the 
immediate  neighborhood  of  Guinea  under  far  less 
favorable  conditions,  Portugal  has  done  absolutely 
nothing.  The  French  and  British  colonics  more 
than  pay  for  themselves.    Guinea  shows  a  large 

253 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


yearly  deficit.  Outside  of  four  towns,  the  Portuguese 
occupy  few  places  and  develop  none.  Portugal's 
title  to  Guinea  is  a  disaster  to  the  inhabitants,  who 
are  good  workers,  owning  good  land.  When  the 
boundary  between  France  and  Portugal  was  definitely 
fixed  in  1906,  the  French  Commissioners  saw  what  a 
rich  countr}^  easy  to  exploit,  was  being  rviined.  To 
those  on  the  Portuguese  side  it  was  "abandon  hope, 
you  who  are  fated  to  remain  here."  The  wealth  of 
the  forests  is  almost  entirely  neglected. 

The  port  of  Bissao  is  connected  only  monthly 
with  Lisbon.  The  greater  part  of  the  commerce, 
both  exports  and  imports,  is  in  the  hands  of  Ger- 
many. 

Sao  Thome  and  Principe  are  beautiful  islands, 
fertile,  and,  when  one  takes  into  consideration  their 
nearness  to  the  equator,  salubrious.  Almost  every- 
thing in  the  way  of  tropical  product  has  been  tried 
on  these  two  islands.  But  during  the' past  quarter  of 
a  century,  cocoa  has  been  grown  so  successfully  that 
it  now  furnishes  ninety-five  per  cent  of  the  total 
exportation,  and  has  given  to  the  Portuguese  Minis- 
try of  Colonies  the  delightful  and  tmaccustomed 
surprise  of  a  colony  with  a  budget  surplus.  And  yet 
only  a  third  of  the  total  area  is  cultivated  and  only  a 
sixth  is  worked  to  yield  in  a  scientific  modem  way. 
For  there  are  no  satisfactory  means  of  communication. 
When  cocoa  first  became  a  source  of  wealth  easier  to 
tap  than  gold  mines,  the  question  of  establishing 
means  of  transport  and  communications  that  would 
put  the  two  islands  wholly  under  modem  cultivation 
was  raised.    In  fact,  a  law  was  passed  in  1899  for 

254 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


railway  construction.  It  has  been  pushed  (?)  in  so 
typically  Portuguese  a  manner  that  nine  miles  have 
been  completed  on  Sao  Thome  in  fifteen  years,  and 
the  plans  for  Principe  are  still  being  studied.  Roads 
and  Httle  coast  ports  and  overhead  cables  have  also 
been  planned.  They  may  come  in  time.  Up  to  now, 
the  backs  of  negroes  still  afford  the  chief  means  of 
transport.  The  trouble  is  that  the  Portuguese 
Government  uses  the  surplus  from  the  cocoa  industry 
of  these  islands  to  try  to  meet  the  huge  deficits  of 
the  other  colonies. 

Portuguese  exploitation  of  native  labor  in  Sao 
Thome  and  Principe  stands  forth,  next  to  the  rubber 
atrocities  of  Belgium  in  the  Congo,  as  the  darkest 
page  of  European  colonization  in  Africa.  In  1907, 
when  the  Congo  agitation  was  at  its  height,  Mr. 
H.  W.  Nevinson  made  a  trip  through  Angola,  starting 
inland  from  Loanda  and  coming  out  to  the  coast  at 
Benguela.  He  then  visited  the  two  cocoa  islands. 
His  book.  Modern  Slavery,  is  a  terrible  indictment  of 
Portuguese  officialdom  and  greed.  He  proved  that 
the  method  of  recruiting  laborers  in  Angola  for  the 
cocoa  plantations  was  slave  trade  of  the  most  heart- 
rending sort.  Portugal  was  compelling  her  main- 
land natives  to  go  to  Sao  Thome  and  Principe  to  work 
on  the  cocoa  plantations.  They  were  recruited  with 
no  consideration  whatever  for  principles  of  human- 
ity, and  were  allowed  to  suffer  and  die  on  the  islands, 
driven  to  work  as  the  Pharaohs  used  to  drive  their 
subjects  to  pyramid-building.  Mr.  Nevinson  said 
that  the  callous  indifference  of  the  Portuguese  Gov- 
ernment to  treaty  obUgations  should  call  for  the 

255 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


intervention  of  governments  "more  sensible  to  the 
claims  of  civilization  and  Christianity."  The  great 
English  cocoa  firm  of  Cadbur>'  sent  out  a  competent 
and  reliable  man  to  investigate  the  accusations  of 
Mr.  Nevinson.  His  report  confirmed  in  every  par- 
ticular the  story  told  in  Modern  Slavery. 

The  British  Government  made  representations  at 
Lisbon.  But,  just  as  at  Brussels,  English  agitation 
was  interpreted  as  due  to  commercial  jealousy.  The 
Portuguese  resented  what  they  called  "unfounded 
accusations"'  and  "hypocritical  sentimentality." 
Only  when  Portugal  saw  that  British  public  senti- 
ment was  resulting  in  a  boycott  of  her  cocoa  were 
measures  taken  to  reform  the  heartless  methods  of 
exploiting  natives.  The  menace  to  the  pocketbook 
and  not  the  appeal  to  humanity  led  Lisbon  to 
announce  in  November,  1907,  that  the  adminis- 
tration of  the  Portuguese  colonies  would  be  reformed. 
More  than  a  year  passed  before  anything  was  done . 

In  July,  1909,  a  royal  decree  suspended  for  three 
months  recruiting  of  natives  on  the  Angola  mainland 
for  island  plantations.  Sir  Edward  Grey  told  the 
British  Parliament  that  Portugal  seemed  now  to  give 
proof  of  an  honest  intention  to  correct  the  abuses. 
Portuguese  action  was  hurried  by  the  news  that  the 
large  cocoa  firms  of  the  United  States  had  decided 
(in  the  summer  of  1909)  to  join  British  manufactur- 
ers in  boycotting  Portuguese  cocoa.  Portugal  had 
to  take  the  matter  up  with  the  British  Antislavery 

'  A  Portuguese  official  investigator  reported  that  the  natives 
were  "not  badly  treated,"  but  fifty  thousand  were  being  retained 
after  the  expiration  of  their  "contracts." 

256 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


Society,  and  assure  its  officials,  by  giving  them  a 
chance  to  investigate  themselves,  that  the  Angola 
slave  trade  had  been  stopped.  The  heavy  mortality 
among  the  laborers  in  Principe  was  attributed  by  the 
Portuguese  to  sleeping  sickness.  It  was  proposed  to 
recruit  laborers,  under  proper  safeguards,  from 
Mozambique,  with  the  promise  of  repatriation  on  the 
completion  of  a  two  years'  contract. 

The  Portuguese  settled  at  the  mouth  of  the  Congo 
before  Columbus  discovered  America,  and  have  had 
coast  settlements  from  the  Congo  south  to  Tiger 
Bay  for  four  hundred  years.  Portuguese  West 
Africa,  or  Angola,  as  it  is  commonly  known,  is  four- 
teen times  the  size  of  Portugal,  and  has  a  wonderful 
coast  line  with  many  ports  of  great  value,  and  rivers 
through  all  the  interior,  navigable  for  long  distances 
from  the  ocean.  Its  hinterland  is  a  continental 
watershed,  containing  sources  of  Congo  tributaries 
and  the  headwaters  of  the  Zambesi.  And  yet 
although  its  soil  is  fertile  and  its  forests  rich,  the 
colony  has  never  been  properly  exploited.  It  still 
imports  more  than  it  exports,  and  costs  Portugal 
yearly  enormous  sums  of  money,  which  are  only  met 
by  taking  the  surplus  of  the  cocoa  producing  islands 
and  increasing  the  Portuguese  national  debt.  Had 
it  not  been  for  the  necessity  of  forming  fixed  boundary 
lines  with  Germany,  Great  Britain,  and  Belgium,  much 
of  the  interior  would  still  be  unexplored.  As  it  is, 
there  are  portions  of  Angola  of  which  the  Portuguese 
know  very  little.  The  tribes  of  the  interior  have 
not  all  accepted  Portuguese  authority.  They  have 
necessitated,  especially  during  the  period  under  our 
17  257 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 

review  (before  that  they  were  mostly  let  alone), 
numerous  military  expeditions.  The  hinterland  is 
not  organized  effectively  either  from  the  miUtary 
or  civil  point  of  view. 

In  1904,  native  troubles  were  serious.  After  two 
hundred  and  fifty  soldiers  in  outlying  posts  had  been 
massacred,  the  authorities  felt  the  necessity  of  send- 
ing out  a  punitive  expedition  five  thousand  strong. 
In  1905,  there  was  a  new  revolt  of  considerable  extent 
near  the  German  frontier.  In  1907,  regiments  had 
to  be  sent  in  a  hurry  to  Angola  from  Lisbon.  In 
1 91 2,  there  was  considerable  fighting  on  the  Katanga 
border.  In  1914,  the  natives  of  the  south  and  of  the 
Congo  frontier  were  once  more  in  rebellion.  With  all 
these  military  operations,  costing  sums  that  Portugal 
had  to  borrow  at  high  interest,  large  portions  of  the 
interior  are  not  even  organized  as  military  districts, 
much  less  brought  under  civil  administration! 

The  Belgians  to  the  north,  with  their  very  narrow 
coast  Hne, — enjoying  only  free  access  to  the  mouth  os 
the  river,  in  fact, — have  got  the  trade  from  the  inte- 
rior, which  ought  to  be  Portuguese,  largely  in  their 
hands.  The  Germans  on  the  south,  with  a  colony 
that  has  no  ports  and  a  hinterland  not  one  tenth 
as  rich  as  that  of  Angola,  have  covered  their  posses- 
sion with  a  network  of  railways,  and  made  their 
colony  self-supporting.  When  we  see  what  the 
British  have  done  in  the  hinterland  in  the  creation  of 
Rhodesia,  we  realize  how  fortunate  for  the  world  it 
is  that  a  British  ultimatum,  twenty-five  years  ago, 
prevented  Portugal  from  extending  her  sovereignty 
from  one  coast  colony  to  the  other.    Rhodesia,  with 

258 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


its  rapid  economic  development  and  its  extensive 
railways,  is  a  reproach  to  Portugal. 

Unlike  Germany  and  Great  Britain,  Portugal  has 
tried  to  make  her  colonies  a  preserve  for  herself. 
Her  tariff  scheme  in  Angola  is  calculated  in  such  a 
way  that  Portuguese  ship  owners  and  Portuguese 
merchants  will  make  all  the  profit  out  of  the  exploi- 
tation of  the  colony.  Portuguese  products  pay  only 
ten  per  cent  of  the  tariff.  Other  products,  dis- 
embarked at  Lisbon,  and  reexported  from  there  to 
Angola,  enjoy  a  reduction  of  twenty  per  cent.  Imports 
entering  Angola  under  the  Portuguese  flag  pay  only 
half  the  tariff.  The  result  is,  of  course,  insufficiency 
of  shipping  facilities  for  exports,  and  contraband 
over  the  Belgian"  frontier  and  a  prohibitive  price  of 
articles  coming  into  the  colony  from  abroad.  The 
Portuguese  customs  lose  far  more  revenue  than  they 
gain  by  their  tariffs,  and  the  high  cost  of  living  pro- 
hibits successful  colonization.  If  Portugal  had  the 
shipping  facilities  for  developing  herself  the  possibili- 
ties of  Angola  trade,  or  if  she  manufactured  in  Portu- 
gal articles  to  sell  to  her  colony,  there  might  be  some 
justification  for  this  tariff  policy.  As  it  is,  Portugal 
cuts  off  her  nose  to  spite  her  face.  She  has  huge  sums 
to  pay  to  retain  possession  of  the  colony  at  all ;  colo- 
nists and  natives  are  in  a  bad  economic  state;  and 
Africa  suffers  from  the  maladministration  and  non- 
productivity  of  one  of  its  richest  areas. 

Formerly,  Angola  lived  from  slave  traffic.  When 
that  was  stopped,  sugar  cane  was  grown  to  manu- 
facture spirits  for  native  consumption.  The  Brus- 
sels Act  of  1899,  in  which  the  European  states 

259 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


holding  African  possessions  pledged  themselves 
to  put  excessive  taxes  on  alcohol  in  order  to  stop 
its  use  by  natives,  ruined  this  industry — if  it  can  be 
called  by  that  name.  The  Brussels  Conference  of 
1906  raised  the  tax  by  thirty  per  cent,  for  a  period 
of  ten  3^ears.  Portugal  was  allowed  to  retain  the  old 
tax  in  Angola,  but  the  industry  was  already  con- 
demned.   Nothing  has  replaced  it. 

Cotton  is  indigenous  to  Angola.  Before  the 
development  of  the  rubber  boom,  it  was  the  great 
industry.  It  could  become  so  again:  for  Portugal 
uses  nearly  half  a  million  pounds  of  American  cotton.  ^ 
This  could  easily  be  raised  in  Angola.  Laws  were 
passed  in  1901  and  1906  to  encourage  the  cotton 
industry  in  the  Portuguese  colonies.  But  results 
have  not  been  encouraging.  Methods  of  planting 
and  harvesting  are  primitive;  means  of  transport  are 
lacking ;  the  tariff  regime  discourages  colonization  and 
foreign  capital;  and  Portugal  has  no  capital  herself. 

One  can  say,  however,  that  Portugal  has  of  recent 
years  tried  hard  to  remedy  conditions  in  Angola. 
The  trouble  is  that  her  handicaps  are  too  great  for 
her.  She  fears  that  giving  out  concessions  on  a 
large  scale  to  foreign  concerns  will  mean  the  eventual 
loss  of  the  colony.  Her  own  people  are  ignorant 
and  poor.  Her  Government  has  no  conception  of  a 
free  trade  regime.  To  illustrate  the  evil  of  the 
Portuguese  protective  system,  one  has  only  to  cite 
the  reason  for  lack  of  labor.  It  is  not  due  to  lack 
of  hands,  but  to  the  high  price  of  food  to  feed  the 

•  Eighty  thousand  families  in  Portugal  are  dependent  upon  cot- 
ton industries  and  trade. 

260 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


hands  and  to  lack  of  machinery  for  development. 
When  the  freight  charges,  due  to  trans-shipment 
at  Lisbon  or  to  high  Portuguese  steamship  and  rail- 
way rates,  or  the  direct  entry  duties,  are  added  to  the 
original  price  of  everything  that  is  imported,  it  puts 
the  cost  of  production  so  high  that  developing  the 
country  does  not  pay. 

There  are  three  lines  of  railway  into  the  interior  at 
the  present  time,  from  Loanda,  Benguela  (Lobita 
Harbor) ,  and  Mossamedes.  The  Loanda  line  is  owned 
by  a  private  Portuguese  company,  the  Benguela  line 
is  an  English  concession,  and  the  Mossamedes  line  is 
state-owned.  The  Loanda  line  has  reached  about 
half  way  to  the  Belgian  frontier.  The  Mossamedes 
line,  after  ten  years,  has  not  progressed  much  more 
than  a  hundred  miles.  The  English  line  from  Lobita 
Harbor,  which  leaves  the  coast  at  Benguela,  was 
started  in  1902  by  a  British  engineer,  who  formed  a 
company  for  the  purpose  of  building  a  trans-conti- 
nental railway  to  join  the  line  from  Beira  to  Rhode- 
sia. In  ten  years  this  line  reached  Bihe,  and  at  last 
accounts  was  being  rapidly  pushed  toward  the 
Marotseland  frontier.  It  will  follow  the  valley  of 
the  Lungwebungu  River  to  the  Zambesi  and  then 
down  the  Zambesi  to  Victoria  Falls,  where  it  will 
meet  the  Cape  to  Cairo  railway.  When  this  line  is 
completed,  the  mails  from  the  Cape  to  London  will 
save  four  days,  and  Rhodesia  will  be  nearer  England 
in  time  than  the  Commonwealth.  A  northeastern 
branch  to  this  railway  will  run  from  Bihe  into  the 
Katanga  province  of  the  Belgian  Congo,  opening  up 
an  enormously  rich  and  still  partially  unexploited 

261 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


territory.  Although  this  railway  is  being  financed 
and  constructed  by  British  capitaHsts  and  engineers, 
there  has  been  some  official  opposition  to  it  in  British 
Government  circles,  on  the  ground  that  it  will  deflect 
considerable  trade  from  the  Cape  to  subsidized 
Portuguese  and  German  steamship  lines. 

The  annual  deficit  of  Angola  increased  rapidly 
before  the  war,  and  reached  in  19 12  double  the 
revenue.  In  1913,  the  situation  of  the  colony  was 
desperate.  A  group  of  Portuguese  banks  offered  to 
loan  eight  million  dollars  to  the  Government  at  six 
and  a  quarter  per  cent,  to  be  used  exclusively  for 
railway  development  in  Angola.  In  the  spring 
of  1914,  however,  the  Colonial  Minister  told  Parlia- 
ment that  not  less  than  forty  million  dollars  was 
reqtiired,  and  that  something  must  be  done  immediately 
to  demonstrate  to  the  world  the  ability  of  Portugal  to 
administer  and  develop  this  colony.'^  He  declared 
that  the  lack  of  effective  administrative  control  was 
clearly  demonstrated  by  the  yield  of  the  hut  tax, 
which  was  only  one  hundred  and  forty  thousand 
dollars,  when  it  ought  to  be  three  million  dollars. 
His  remedy  was  incorporated  in  a  project  of  the  law, 
providing  for  a  huge  loan  to  finish  the  railways,  roads, 
and  ports;  revision  of  laws  concerning  land  conces- 
sion, native  labor,  commerce  and  industry,  revision 
of  tariffs;  creation  of  new  lines  of  navigation  between 

'  Senor  Lisboa  e  Lima  had  undoubtedly  received  official  intimation 
of  the  serious  "conversations"  going  on  at  that  moment  between 
Great  Britain  and  Germany.  He  accepted  during  the  same  month, 
without  Britain  opposing  offers  of  a  German  syndicate  and  German 
banks  to  help  in  Angola. 

262 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


Europe  and  the  colony,  organization  of  a  liberal 
banking  and  credit  system  in  the  colony ;  new  law  for 
colonization,  to  encourage  small  colonists;  and  a 
revision  of  the  tariffs  of  the  mother  country  in  every- 
thing that  concerns  colonial  products.  Within 
three  months  came  the  war. 

Portuguese  East  Africa  was,  like  Portuguese  West 
Africa,  a  fifteenth-century  colony,  settled  as  a 
stopping-place  on  the  way  to  India.  It  is  fortunate 
in  its  geographical  position.  One  has  only  to  look  at 
the  map  to  see  how  essential  to  the  British  in  South 
Africa  is  the  retention  of  this  vast  country  by  a  weak 
nation,  which  can  be  held  under  British  tutelage. 
For  over  a  thousand  miles  the  western  boundary  of 
the  colony  touches  the  Transvaal  and  Rhodesia. 
The  southern  portion  of  Nyasaland,  including  the 
whole  valley  of  the  Shire,  is  an  enclave  in  Portuguese 
territory.  The  Zambesi,  from  the  junction  of  the 
Loangwa  River  to  its  mouth,  runs  through  Portu- 
guese East  Africa.  The  northern  part  of  the  colony 
touches  the  shore  of  Lake  Nyasa.  To  the  port  of 
Beira,  in  the  center,  runs  the  railway  from  Rhodesia 
to  the  sea.  To  the  port  of  Lorenzo  Alarques  in  the 
south  runs  the  railway  from  the  Transvaal  to  the  sea. 
Were  it  not  for  the  outlet  through  friendly  Portuguese 
territory,  Nyasaland  and  Rhodesia  would  be  badly 
landlocked.  The  same  can  be  said  of  the  northern 
portion  of  the  Transvaal.  For  the  mining  portion 
of  the  Transvaal,  outlet  through  Portuguese  territory 
is  shorter  and  cheaper  than  through  Natal.  To  have 
this  colony  pass  into  German  hands  would  be  a  calam- 
ity to  British  supremacy  in  South  Africa.    From  the 

263 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


standpoint  of  France,  also,  Portugal  is  a  safer  neighbor 
than  Germany.  For  Madagascar  lies  off  the  coast  of 
Portuguese  East  Africa,  and  the  Comoro  Islands  are 
in  the  channel  between  Madagascar  and  Mozambique. 

It  is  difficult  to  overestimate  the  importance  and 
tremendous  possibilities  of  the  territories  under 
the  Portuguese  flag  along  the  Indian  Ocean.  Moz- 
ambique, in  the  north,  neighbor  of  German  East 
Africa  and  British  Nyasaland,  and  holding  a  generous 
coast  line  on  Lake  Nyasa,  is  the  territory  through 
which  the  railway  from  Lake  Nyasa  to  the  coast  must 
run.  Quilimane,  just  south  of  Mozambique,  will 
some  day  be  as  important  as  Delagoa  Bay  in  the 
south.  For  it  is  not  only  the  key  to  the  Shire  River 
valley  of  Nyasaland,  but  to  all  the  Zambesi  valley, 
which  runs  for  a  thousand  miles  in  Portuguese 
territory.  Sofala  Bay,  in  which  is  Beira,  increases  in 
importance  as  Rhodesia  is  developed.  Delagoa  Bay, 
in  which  is  Lorenzo  Marques,  is  the  outlet  for  the 
richest  country  in  Africa. 

To  the  Commonwealth  of  South  Africa,  the  posses- 
sion of  Delagoa  Bay  by  Portugal  is  extremely  unfortu- 
nate, and  has  been  the  cause  of  internal  complications 
for  the  South  Africans.  When  gold  was  discovered 
in  the  Transvaal,  Delagoa  Bay  became  the  natural 
outlet  for  the  Rand.  After  the  British  conquest, 
Natal  expected  this  extremely  profitable  transit 
trade  to  be  deflected  to  Durban.  This  might  have 
been  possible  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  Portugal 
is  the  Transvaal's  neighbor  all  along  the  Transvaal's 
eastern  frontier.  Even  were  it  possible  to  send 
and  receive  the  Rand  and  southern  Transvaal  trade 

264 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


by  way  of  Durban,  the  haul  would  be  considerably 
longer  for  the  northern  Transvaal.  Then,  too,  the 
Rand  depends  upon  the  Portuguese  colony  as  a 
recrinting  ground  for  native  labor.  So  the  port 
of  Lorenzo  Marques  has  prospered  wonderfully  from 
its  transit  trade  with  the  Transvaal. 

Over  fifty  years  ago  Great  Britain  tried  to  claim 
Delagoa  Bay,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  Portuguese 
had  been  in  effective  possession  since  the  end  of 
the  eighteenth  century.  The  British  founded  their 
claim  on  the  fact  that  the  Portuguese  had  not 
occupied  both  sides  of  the  bay  and  all  the  islands 
in  it.  On  the  south  side  of  the  bay  and  on  an  island 
the  British  flag  had  been  planted  in  1823  and  1861. 
The  question  was  submitted  to  arbitration.  The 
decision  rendered  in  1875  was  in  favor  of  Portugal. 
Not  until  after  the  Boer  War  did  the  British  realize 
what  this  award  had  cost  them.^ 

'  During  the  Boer  War,  however,  Great  Britain  constantly  vio- 
lated the  neutrality  of  Portugal  in  East  Africa.  Ammunition 
and  troops  passed  from  Lorenzo  Marques  and  Beira  into  the  interior 
whenever  it  was  convenient  to  have  them  pass  that  way.  The 
British  Government  declared  that  Portugal  was  bound  by  treaty 
to  Britain,  and  that  this  gave  the  right.  But  Portugal  was  bound 
also  by  treaty  to  the  Transvaal,  particularly  in  regard  to  the  very 
Lorenzo-Marques-Pretoria  Railway  in  question.  It  is  the  same 
thesis  as  that  used  by  the  Allies  to  defend  the  Salonica  disembark- 
mcnt.  Greece  is  the  ally  of  Serbia,  etc.  But  at  the  same  moment 
the  Allied  Ministers  sustained  exactly  the  opposite  thesis  at  Buch- 
arest, when  it  was  a  question  of  German  reservists  and  officers  and 
war  material  passing  to  Turkey.  Still,  Rumania  was  at  that  moment 
the  ally  of  Germany  and  Austria-Hungary.  All  of  which  goes  to 
show  that  Governments  are  found  by  treaties  and  international  law 
only  when  it  is  to  their  interest  to  evoke  treaties  and  international 
law  on  their  side. 

265 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


In  1888,  a  railway  line,  built  by  a  private  inter- 
national company,  was  completed  from  Lorenzo 
Marques  to  the  Transvaal  frontier.  It  was  only 
fifty-five  miles  long.  Taking  advantage  of  the 
technicality  that  the  actual  frontier  of  the  Transvaal 
was  several  miles  beyond  the  terminus  of  the  railway, 
and  that  the  concession  was  for  the  construction  of 
the  railway  to  the  frontier,  Portugal  confiscated  the 
line.  After  ten  years  of  litigation,  the  builders  of 
the  railway  were  awarded  damages  that  fell  consider- 
ably short  of  their  claims.  There  were  rumors 
current  that  Great  Britain  and  Germany  were  going 
to  divide  Portuguese  East  Africa  in  return  for 
advancing  the  indemnity  Portugal  was  condemned  to 
pay.  Upon  this  the  Transvaal  Government  offered 
to  loan  Portugal  the  money.  But  Portugal  found 
the  amount  of  the  award  in  a  disinterested  quarter, 
and  saved  what  has  become  her  most  valuable  bit  of 
territory. 

When  the  British  became  masters  of  the  Transvaal, 
Lord  Milner  confirmed,  as  a  modus  vivendi,  the  former 
treaties  of  the  Transvaal  with  Portugal  for  transit 
trade  through  Lorenzo  Marques.  Immediately  after 
peace  was  reestablished,  the  rivalry  became  acute 
between  Cape  Town,  Durban,  and  Lorenzo  Marques 
for  the  Transvaal  carrying  trade.  The  story  of  this 
competition,  which  ended  in  the  treaty  of  April  i, 
1909,  between  Transvaal  and  Portugal,  is  told  else- 
where.' Its  importance  to  Portugal  is  the  fact 
that  it  assured  to  Lorenzo  Marques  a  minimum  of 
fifty  per  cent  of  Transvaal  trade  for  ten  years,  and 

»  See  above,  pp.  78-82 

266 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


thus  establishes  for  Portuguese  East  Africa  a  large 
revenue  from  the  fact  of  the  lucky  position  of  this 
port.  It  is  not  probable,  however,  that  if  Lorenzo 
Marques  remains  Portuguese  territory,  it  will  con- 
tinue to  be  able  to  exact  a  lucrative  toll  without 
giving  more  in  return  than  is  given  now.  There 
is  reason  to  believe  that  the  South  African  Common- 
wealth will  make  every  effort  to  bring  Delagoa  Bay 
and  Lorenzo  Marques  under  the  British  flag  with 
the  peace  settlement  of  the  European  War. 

In  1907,  autonomous  government  on  the  repre- 
sentative system  was  granted  by  Portugal  to  the 
Lorenzo  Marques  district.  In  1910,  on  the  strength 
of  the  Transvaal  Treaty,  Lorenzo  Marques  secured  a 
loan  of  four  million  dollars  to  construct  coal  depots 
and  stone  quays,  dredge  the  channel,  and  renew 
the  rolling  stock  of  the  railway. 

The  problem  of  Portuguese  East  Africa  is  different 
in  every  particular  from  that  of  Angola.  Angola  is  a 
colony  whose  prosperity  and  economic  development 
depend  entirely  upon  the  way  it  is  administered. 
Its  five  thousand  square  miles  of  Africa,  held  by  a 
nation  that  has  neither  the  ability  nor  the  money 
to  make  its  possession  worth  while,  remain  stagnant 
— but  without  serious  consequences  to  any  one  except 
the  owners.  Portuguese  East  Africa,  on  the  other 
hand,  must  be  opened  up  and  pacified  and  devel- 
oped, in  spite  of  the  hopeless  maladministration  of 
the  Portuguese.  It  is  too  far  away,  also,  from 
Portugal  to  suffer,  as  Angola  is  suffering,  from 
the  policy  of  preferential  tariffs.  Portugal  simply 
cannot  assume  to  trade  with  her  East  African  colony 

267 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


as  she  trades  with  her  West  African  colonies. '  The 
imperative  necessities  of  Nyasaland,  Rhodesia,  and 
the  Transvaal  have  made  Chinde,  Beira,  and  Lorenzo 
Marques  open  ports  for  through  trade,  and  have 
led  to  the  estabHshment  of  bonded  warehouses 
under  foreign  control.  Thanks  only  to  the  develop- 
ment of  the  interor  by  Great  Britain,  the  Portu- 
guese have  succeeded  in  extracting  sufficient  toll 
from  transit  trade  to  balance  the  budget  of  this 
colony. 

Nor  has  Portugal  been  allowed  to  say  in  East 
Africa,  as  in  Angola  and  Guinea:  "If  we  are  unable 
to  take  advantage  of  our  colony,  that  is  our  affair. 
We  shall  keep  others  out."  The  fear  of  being 
forcibly  dispossessed  compelled  the  Portuguese  to 
make  tolerable  conditions  of  transit  trade  at  the 
ports,  the  proper  running  of  railways,  and  the  main- 
tenance of  suitable  transport  facilities  on  the  Zam- 
besi. Covetous  neighbors  have  been  kept  from 
encroaching  pohtically  by  the  farming  out  of  large 

'  In  spite  of  the  monthly  P.  and  0.  and  Messageries  Maritimes 
services,  the  Germans  enjoyed  almost  the  monopoly  of  foreign  trade. 
For  a  while  the  British  gave  up  the  north  bound  regular  sailing. 
The  rates  of  the  Deutsch  Ost  Afrika  Linie  to  Hamburg  were  less 
than  the  French  rate  to  Marseilles.  The  same  conditions  prevailed 
even  in  the  British  Indian  Ocean  ports.  German  goods  for  Portu- 
guese territory,  and  for  transit  into  the  Commonwealth  and  Rhodesia 
as  well,  were  rapidly  supplanting  English  goods.  Colonists  as  well 
as  natives  preferred  German  goods,  not  so  much  for  the  reason  that  is 
so  frequently  given  by  English  and  French  writers,  i.e.,  cheaper  price 
for  shoddy  goods,  as  for  their  suitability.  The  Germans  put  on  the 
market  everywhere  in  the  world  what  they  knew,  from  studying 
local  conditions,  customers  wanted — not  what  they  thought  cus- 
tomers ought  to  buy. 

268 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


portions  of  the  colony  to  foreign  capitalists,  After 
the  scare  of  the  British  "big  stick"  in  the  hinter- 
land question,  it  was  believed  that  if  subjects  of  the 
"Great  Powers"  were  given  concessions  on  a  Hberal 
scale,  such  as  Rhodes  and  his  associates  enjoyed 
in  the  interior,  powerful  capitalists  might  find  it  to 
their  interest  to  champion  the  maintenance  of  the 
colony  under  the  Portuguese  flag,  and  Lisbon  would 
have  an  unanswerable  argument  to  the  accusation 
that  the  country  was  not  being  developed.  Char- 
tered companies,  also,  would  enable  Portugal  to 
collect  a  revenue  without  investing  any  money  and 
doing  any  work. 

It  is  impossible  in  the  limits  of  this  book  to  go  into 
the  history  of  the  chartered  companies.  The  most 
important  are  the  Mozambique,  Nyasa,  and  Zambesi 
companies,  which  were  formed  in  1891,  1892,  and 
1894.  Their  twenty-five-year  concessions  are  just 
drawing  to  a  close.  To  these  companies  Portugal 
gave  practically  complete  sovereignty,  in  return  for 
seven  and  a  half  per  cent,  of  their  revenue.  The 
companies  have  had  to  build  the  railways  and  tele- 
graph lines  wholly  at  their  own  expense.  They  have 
enjoyed  the  right  of  giving  sub-concessions.  What 
agricultural  and  mining  development  has  taken  place 
in  Portuguese  East  Africa  is  due  to  these  companies. 
The  Mozambique  Company  founded  Beira,  built  the 
railway  to  Rhodesia,  and  has  developed  the  port. 
The  Zambesi  Company  is  building  the  railway  from 
QuiUmane  to  Shire,  and  manages  the  Zambesi  River 
transport  through  a  sub-concession. 

None  of  the  chartered  companies,  in  spite  of  their 
269 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


possibilities,  have  succeeded  well  under  Portuguese 
rule.  There  are  too  many  discouragements,  and 
too  many  disagreements  with  Lisbon.  Shares  soon 
became  a  speculation.  For  several  years  there  has 
been  a  movement  on  foot  to  suppress  the  charters 
entirely  or  to  make  radical  changes.  Certainly  a 
completely  new  system  of  government  will 'have  to 
be  arranged  for  Portuguese  East  Africa.  To  the 
prosperous  and  growing  hinterland  a  continuation  of 
the  present  regime  is  intolerable. 

In  191 1,  the  shooting  of  a  British  missionary  by  a 
Portuguese  official  on  the  Nyasaland  frontier  led  to 
a  diplomatic  incident  with  Great  Britain  that  shows 
how  Portuguese  colonial  administration  was  viewed 
in  England  just  before  the  war.  The  shooting  was 
established  by  the  evidence  of  competent  witnesses 
to  have  been  wholly  unprovoked.  It  took  a  year  to 
bring  the  official  to  trial  and  then  he  was  sentenced 
to  one  yearns  impriso7ime7it.  The  trial  was  a  farce. 
In  remonstrating,  the  British  Foreign  Office  demand- 
ed that  this  man  be  not  reemployed  in  a  responsible 
position.  The  note  stated  that  the  tragedy  was  the 
result  of  having  an  uneducated  soldier,  totally  unfitted 
for  his  place,  in  a  government  post.  Portugal  was 
told  plainly  that  Great  Britain  could  not  let  this 
incident  pass  without  declaring  that  in  the  future 
only  properly  qualified  officials  must  be  appointed 
to  posts  in  which  they  would  have  to  deal  with 
British  interests  of  serious  importance. 

In  going  over  the  statistics  of  Portuguese  East 
Africa  for  the  decade  before  19 14,  one  is  struck  with 
the  fact  that  the  Portuguese  revenues  are  practically 

270 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


wholly  parasitical,  due  to  the  lucky  accident  of 
geographical  position.  The  British  pay  for  the  use 
of  ports  and  railways.  The  Germans  pay  for  the 
privilege  of  running  Zambesi  River  steamers  and  for 
carrying  the  export  and  import  and  coastal  trade. 
The  natives  find  work  in  the  Transvaal.  From  fifty 
to  sixty  thousand  go  yearly  to  the  mines  in  British 
territory,  and  carry  back  to  spend  in  Portuguese 
territory  three  to  four  million  dollars  a  year.  The 
chartered  companies  pay  for  the  privilege  of  existing 
under  an  obnoxious  regime.  I  wish  I  could  find 
something  encouraging  and  kind  to  say  about  Portu- 
guese colonial  administration.'  There  is  nothing 
in  the  facts  but  ground  for  destructive  criticism. 
This  is  the  only  chapter  in  my  book  where  I  cannot 
do  what  I  like  always  to  do — find  the  bright  spots 
and  bring  them  out  strongly. 

Since  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century, 
with  the  exception  of  one  year,  Portugal  has  had 
to  increase  her  national  debt  to  meet  a  serious 
budget  deficit.  The  balance  of  trade  is  also  increas- 
ing against  Portugal.  The  last  available  statistics 
before  the  war  showed  imports  considerably  more 
than  twice  the  value  of  exports.  Only  Turkey  of  all 
the  European  states  is  so  hopelessly  in  debt.  But 
Turkey's  debt  is  not  larger  than  Portugal's:  and 
Portugal  has  a  quarter  of  Turkey's  population  and 

'  The  Portuguese  themselves  have  evidently  passed  adverse 
judgment  on  their  colonial  administration.  For  in  Africa  more 
Portuguese  live  outside  of  Portuguese  rule  than  under  it.  There 
are  many  more  Portuguese  in  the  American  colony  of  Hawaii,  on 
the  other  side  of  the  world  from  Portugal,  than  in  all  the  Portuguese 
colonies  put  together. 

271 


THE  NEW  IvIAP  OF  AFRICA 


not  a  tithe  of  Turkey's  resources.  Portugal's  debt, 
in  fact,  is  nearly  as  large  as  that  of  the  United 
States  and  bears  more  interest.  Half  of  Portugal 
is  uncultivated,  only  two  per  cent,  of  her  area  wooded, 
her  merchant  marine  smaller  than  that  of  any  nation 
with  an  ocean  coast  except  China,  and  her  navy 
smaller  than  that  of  any  nation  except  Norway. 
Between  seventy  and  eighty  per  cent  of  her  popula- 
tion is  illiterate. 

In  every  nation  an  anti-colonial  policy  has  been 
adopted  by  advanced  radicals.  European  govern- 
ments have  had  the  same  experience  as  that  of  the 
United  States.  The  SociaHsts  of  Germany,  Belgium, 
Italy,  France,  and  Spain,  and  the  Labor  Party  of 
Great  Britain,  have  been  untiring  in  their  criticism 
of  colonial  administration  and  their  opposition  to 
colonial  budgets  and  colonial  military  expeditions. 
Radicals  are  aknost  always  anti-imperiaHsts.  Portu- 
gal has  been  no  exception  to  the  general  rule.  Her 
radicals  have  fotind  the  armor  of  their  government 
much  the  easiest  in  the  world  to  pierce.  To  tmder- 
stand  the  internal  history  of  Portugal,  and  her 
colonial  policy  since  the  accession  of  the  ill-fated 
Dom  Carlos,  it  is  essential  to  keep  constantly  in 
mind  the  struggle  of  RepubHcan  elements  against 
the  dynasty.  The  Republican  party  has  always 
used  the  colonial  question  to  attack  the  monarchy. 
One  moment  the  Republicans  would  be  the  cham- 
pions of  Portuguese  pride  against  Great  Britain  and 
Germany,  and  the  next  the  defenders  of  Portuguese 
taxpayers  against  the  Colonial  Minister's  demands 
upon  the  budget. 

272 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


The  assassination  of  Carlos  and  his  heir  in  1908, 
followed  by  the  exptilsion  of  Manoel  in  1910,  brought 
the  problem  of  the  Portuguese  colonies  once  more 
before  the  world  as  a  question  of  far-reaching  inter- 
national importance.  During  the  four  years  between 
the  birth  of  the  Republic  and  the  beginning  of  the 
European  War,  there  were  constant  rumors  of  the 
intention  of  Portugal  to  sell  her  colonies  to  Ger- 
many. Discerning  readers  could  see  in  the  way 
these  reports  were  commented  upon  a  clear  indi- 
cation of  how  Great  Britain  and  Germany  w^ere 
drifting  towards  war. 

The  unwillingness  of  the  British  to  execute  the 
Chamberlain  Treaty  of  1898  or  to  allow  Germany 
to  deal  directly  with  Portugal  in  this  question  was  a 
sure  sign  of  their  determination  not  to  allow  Germany 
to  establish  naval  stations  and  coaling  bases  that 
might  jeopardize  Britain's  maritime  supremacy. 
The  articles  of  Blatchford  and  the  general  campaign 
of  alarm  against  Germany  in  the  British  press  were 
indicative  of  this  (determination.  There  were  many 
liberals  in  Great  Britain  and  Germany  who  deter- 
mined that  the  two  nations  should  not  be  allowed  to 
drift  into  war.  They  tried  their  best  to  bring  about 
an  understanding  between  the  governments  on  the 
naval  program  and  other  points  at  issue.  Among 
the  important  questions  that  came  up  in  these 
informal  and  semi-official  pourparlers  was  the  prob- 
lem of  the  Portuguese  colonies. 

Shortly  before  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  it  was  the 
behef  in  Portugal  that  the  two  great  rivals  had  come 
to  a  new  understanding.  This  time,  Germany  was 
18  273 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  have  all  of  Angola,  and  was  to  give  up  in  re- 
turn to  Great  Britain  privileges  that  her  subjects  had 
acquired  in  Mozambique.  So  persistent  were  these 
rumors  that  they  were  noticed  editorially  in  the 
London  press.  The  Times  declared  that  there  was 
nothing  in  the  new  Anglo-German  accord  to  diminish 
the  value  of  the  Anglo-Portuguese  alliance,  and  no 
intention  to  despoil  Portugal,  either  by  purchase  or 
any  other  means,  of  any  of  her  colonies.  An  im- 
portant German  newspaper  at  the  same  time,  speak- 
ing of  the  law  for  the  development  of  Angola,  just 
presented  to  the  Portuguese  Parliament  by  the  Colo- 
nial Minister,  said:  "These  plans  seem  to  us  deserv- 
ing of  commendation.  The  exposition  of  the  Minister 
of  Colonies  is  characterised  by  undoubted  sincerity, 
and  his  project  of  law  seems  to  be  well  worked  out  in 
all  its  details. 

Three  days  after  Great  Britain  joined  France 
and  Russia  against  Germany,  Premier  Machado 
stated  that  Portugal  could  not  disregard  the  duty 
of  her  alliance  with  England,  and  the  Lisbon  Parlia- 
ment declared  that  Portugal  was  on  the  side  of  the 
Allies  "as  much  as  is  necessary  and  up  to  what- 
ever point  is  necessary."  But  for  nearly  eighteen 
months  there  was  no  certain  indication  that  Portugal 
intended  to  embroil  herself  with  Germany.  The 
people  certainly  wanted  to  fight,  especially  after 
an  actual  state  of  war  had  arisen  in  Angola,  where 
German  and  Portuguese  soldiers  came  into  frontier 
conflict.    It  is  not  easy  at  the  present  writing  to 

'  See  leaders  in  London  Times,  May  28,  19 14,  and  Kdlnische 
Zeitung,  May  22,  1914. 

274 


PROBLEM  OF  PORTUGUESE  COLONIES 


give  a  clear  idea  of  what  has  happened  in  Portugal 
during  these  past  two  years.  According  to  the 
sympathies  of  the  man  to  whom  you  talk  or  the 
newspaper  you  read,  is  the  information  given  to  you. 
As  far  as  I  can  gather,  the  question  of  intervention 
or  non-intervention  in  Portugal  was  the  old  question 
of  Republic  or  Monarchy.  The  Germanophiles 
and  anti-war  partisans  were  monarchists.  The 
Government  got  into  the  hands  of  the  reactionaries. 
Although  troops  were  sent  to  Africa  to  fight  the 
Germans,  and  although  the  Portuguese  Cabinet 
received  from  ParHament  on  November  23,  1914, 
full  power  to  declare  war  upon  Germany,  Baron  von 
Rosen,  the  German  Minister  at  Lisbon,  seemed  to 
retain  great  power.  ParHament  was  closed  by  armed 
force,  municipal  councils  dissolved,  and  functionaries 
of  the  old  regime  reappointed  to  prefectures  and  sub- 
prefectures.  It  required  what  was  virtually  a  second 
revolution  to  maintain  the  RepubHc. 

When  Germany  declared  war  on  Portugal  in  the 
spring  of  191 6,  a  new  situation  was  not  established 
in  Africa,  where  the  Portuguese  had  long  been  in 
open  conflict  with  the  Germans.  But  it  made  easier 
the  final  stages  of  the  conquest  of  German  East 
Africa. 

Portugal's  alliance  with  Great  Britain  and  France 
may  save  her  colonics  for  a  while.  But  they  cer- 
tainly will  not  be  retained  permanently,  unless, 
with  French  and  British  help,  they  are  properly 
developed.  The  parable  of  the  Ten  Talents  works 
in  colonies  as  well  as  in  everything  else. 


275 


CHAPTER  XIV 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 

THERE  are  four  British  colonies  in  West  Africa. 
On  the  extreme  western  coast  of  the  continent, 
Gambia,  extending  back  for  several  hundred 
miles  along  the  banks  of  the  Gambia  River,  is  a 
.narrow  enclave  in  French  territory,  just  south  of 
Senegal.  Sierra  Leone  has  a  considerable  extent  of 
coast  line,  but  not  much  hinterland,  south  and  west 
of  French  Guinea,  and  west  and  north  of  Liberia. 
Farther  east,  on  the  north  littoral  of  the  Gulf  of 
Guinea,  the  Gold  Coast  Colony  parallels  German 
Togoland,  and  is,  together  with  Togoland,  an  enclave 
in  French  territory  between  the  Ivory  Coast  and 
Dahomey.  The  northern  frontier  of  the  Ivory  Coast 
Colony  is  an  arbitrary  line,  which  marks  equally  the 
northern  confines  of  Togoland.  But  the  Gold  Coast 
is  almost  twice  as  wide  as  Togoland,  and  has  a  very 
much  more  extended  coast  line.  In  fact,  as  elsewhere 
in  Africa,  the  Germans  are  shut  off  from  a  logical 
and  natural  portion  of  their  coast  line  by  a  projection 
of  British  territory.  Nigeria  is  much  larger  than  the 
other  three  colonies  put  together.  It  has  a  very 
important  portion  of  the  coast  line  on  the  Gulf  of 
Guinea,  just  west  of  the  bend,  and  contains  the  lower 
valley  of  the  Niger  River,  with  its  delta,  and  the 

276 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


outlet  of  Benue  River,  which,  with  all  its  tributaries 
except  one,  has  its  source  in  German  Kamerun.  The 
northern  boundary  of  Nigeria  extends  nearly  to  14° 
N.,  and  has  most  of  the  western  border  of  Lake 
Chad.  Its  southern  and  eastern  neighbor  is 
Kamerun.  Nigeria  projects  into  the  German  colony 
far  enough  to  control  Yola  at  the  confluence  of  the 
rivers  which  form  the  Benue. 

All  four  of  these  possessions  are  protectorates  in 
the  hinterland  and  Crown  Colonies  on  the  coast. 
The  latter  two  have  been  formed  gradually  by  the 
same  process  of  penetration  as  in  East  Africa,  and 
are  still  in  the  process  of  transition.  Just  as  in 
British  East  Africa,  the  Government  has  been 
changed — or  rather  organized  and  consolidated — dur- 
ing the  period  of  our  survey. 

Gambia  and  Sierra  Leone  are  extensions  of  the 
old  British  West  African  settlements  of  Bathurst  on 
the  Island  of  St.  Mary  and  of  Freetown.  Both 
colonies  are  extremely  interesting  as  examples  of  pros- 
perity that  has  come  during  the  past  fifteen  years, 
and  of  the  unadulterated  profit  that  England  enjoys 
from  the  possession  of  bits  of  territory  Hke  these 
scattered  all  over  the  world.  In  Gambia,  trade 
doubled  from  1906  to  1912,  and  reached  over  £2,000,- 
000  in  1913.  Forty  per  cent,  of  the  imports  were 
English  goods  from  Liverpool.  The  surplus  of 
revenue  over  expenditure  was  nearly  £30,000,  and 
the  whole  country  was  kept  in  order  by  one  hundred 
and  twenty-five  soldiers  and  native  policemen. 
The  colony  has  no  debts,  and  is  no  expense  whatever 
to  the  mother  country. 

277 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


In  Sierra  Leone  revenue  has  exceeded  expenditure 
since  1905,  and  trade  almost  doubled  between  1908 
and  1913,  passing  in  the  latter  year  £3,000,000. 
Two-thirds  of  the  imports  were  furnished  by  England, 
and  two-thirds  of  the  total  trade  was  carried  on 
British  ships.  A  narrow  gauge  railway,  owned  by  the 
Government,  runs  directly  across  the  colony  from 
Freetown  to  the  Liberian  frontier,  and  another  line 
is  being  constructed  through  the  northern  portion  of 
the  colony  to  the  French  frontier.  Freetown  is  a 
fortified  coaling  station. 

Two  matters  of  general  interest  in  the  history  of 
European  colonization  stand  out  during  the  past 
fifteen  years  in  Sierra  Leone.  In  the  hinterland,  when 
the  Protectorate  was  organized  administratively, 
nine-tenths  of  its  revenue  came  from  the  imposition 
of  a  hut  tax.  The  natives  protested  against  this, 
and  it  was  exceedingly  difficult  to  make  them  under- 
stand the  reason  for  it.  There  were  many  revolts, 
and  in  some  cases  tribal  chiefs,  who  assisted  the 
authorities  in  its  collection,  were  killed  or  driven  into 
exile.  Some  Europeans  took  the  side  of  the  natives, 
and  claimed  that  the  prosperity  of  the  colony  was 
steadily  declining  because  of  the  persistence  in  exact- 
ing this  tax.  But  in  an  uncivilized  country,  where 
import  duties  are  negligible  and  where  the  Govern- 
ment can  hardly  adopt  the  former  customs  of  warlike 
tribes  to  collect  a  tax  on  through  trade,  seeing  that 
they  went  into  the  country  on  the  pretext  of  destroy- 
ing this  very  practice,  how  can  expenses  be  met  dur- 
ing the  years  of  economic  development  in  any  other 
way  than  by  a  head  tax  or  a  hut  tax?    Until  protec- 

278 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


torates  are  fully  organized,  the  hut  tax  is  by  far  the 
more  feasible.  Homes  can  be  located,  their  number 
established,  and  difficulties  of  identity  avoided — 
especially  where  a  population  is  migratory  or  can 
easily  become  so  to  avoid  taxation.  By  quiet  and 
steady  persistence,  the  Sierra  Leone  authorities  were 
able  to  report  in  191 3  that  there  was  trouble  over  the 
hut  tax  collection  in  only  one  district. 

The  second  matter  is  the  fight  against  secret  can- 
nibalistic societies,  whose  practices  are  repugnant  to 
European  ideas  of  humanity  and  justice.  As  British 
control  spread  to  the  interior,  it  was  the  policy  to 
continue  to  keep  order  and  to  administer  justice,  as 
well  as  to  collect  taxes,  through  native  chiefs  and  in 
accordance  with  native  laws.  But  where  an  organ- 
ization known  as  the  "Human  Leopards"  was  hold- 
ing secret  meetings,  with  a  ritual  demanding  the 
sacrifice  of  boys  and  girls,  followed  by  a  cannibalistic 
feast,  the  authorities  felt  compelled  to  intervene,  and 
declare  that  such  practices  would  be  treated  as 
murder.  In  1905,  there  were  twenty-eight  murder 
convictions  for  the  crimes  of  this  organization. 
After  eight  years  of  unremitting  effort,  the  authorities 
reported  that  they  had  not  yet  succeeded  in  getting 
the  better  of  the  "Human  Leopards.  "  In  1913,  over 
three  hundred  persons,  including  several  paramount 
and  tribal  chiefs,  were  arrested,  and  a  special  court 
was  set  up  to  try  them.  It  was  exceedingly  difficult 
to  get  evidence  even  from  the  relatives  of  the  victims. 
Only  twenty-four  could  be  brought  to  trial,  and  nine 
convictions  for  murder  were  secured.  There  were 
seven  executions. 

279 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Organizations  like  the  "Human  Leopards"  furnish 
one  of  the  most  perplexing  problems  of  the  European 
administrator  in  the  interior  of  Africa.  They  have 
probably  existed  for  centuries,  are  ingrained  in  the 
character  and  habits  of  the  people,  and  are  believed 
to  be  a  medicinal  and  spiritual  necessity.  Aside 
from  officials,  there  are  probably  less  than  fifty 
Europeans  in  the  protectorate  portion  of  Sierra 
Leone  among  a  native  population  of  nearly  a  million 
and  a  half.  It  is  open  to  question  whether  one  can 
compel  the  natives  to  adopt  a  European  attitude 
toward  practices  that  are  repugnant  to  our  nature, 
until,  living  among  them  and  revealing  to  them  our 
civilization  by  example  as  well  as  by  word,  we  make 
these  practices  repugnant  to  their  nature. 

In  regard  to  both  of  these  problems,  which  are 
found  in  the  recent  history  of  other  protectorates 
besides  Sierra  Leone — every  protectorate,  in  fact, 
that  claims  sway  over  the  interior  of  the  African 
continent — the  reader  may  ask  whether  it  is  logical 
and  just  to  force  an  alien  Government  and  alien 
standards  upon  the  natives  against  their  will,  com- 
pel them  to  pay  taxes  to  support  what  they  do  not 
want  and  hate,  and  punish  them  when  they  violate 
an  ethical  code  which  is  peculiarly  ours  and  of  which 
they  have  no  conception.  This  question  comes  up 
everywhere  in  the  pages  of  recent  African  history. 
The  answer  is  very  simple,  much  more  simple  than  it 
seems  on  the  face  of  it.  We  ask  the  question  only  be- 
cause Africa  to-day  affords  the  example  of  transition 
that  long  ago  took  place  in  Europe  and  more  recently 
in  America.    In  Africa  we  see  with  our  own  eyes  and 

280 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


in  our  own  day  the  working  out  of  the  inevitable  law 
of  the  imposition  of  the  superior  civilization  upon  the 
inferior  civilization.  It  is  the  triumph  of  mind  over 
matter,  of  knowledge  over  ignorance.  The  survival 
of  the  fittest  is  a  spiritual  rather  than  a  physical  test. 
We  cannot  get  away  from  the  white  man's  burden. 
The  impulse  to  make  others  like  oneself  has  always 
been  as  strong  in  the  human  race  as  the  impulse  to 
propagate  the  species. 

The  man  who  opposes  and  ridicules  and  deprecates 
missionary  effort  is  logical  only  if  he  is  sincerely 
willing  to  have  himself,,  his  family,  and  his  country, 
lapse  back  into  the  period  when  his  ancestors  walked 
through  the  forests  of  Germany  with  untanned  skins 
hanging  from  their  necks  and  clubs  in  their  hands, 
looking  for  men  from  the  next  village  to  kill.  By  the 
same  token,  the  Government  official,  who  is  grap- 
pling with  problems  of  civilizing  natives  under  his 
charge,  is  logical,  when  he  condemns  missionary  effort, 
only  if  he  denies  that  Christian  influence  has  created 
the  institutions  he  is  trying,  by  purely  secular  means, 
to  force  the  savages  to  understand  and  accept. 
Education  alone  will  civilize  Africa.  The  spread  of 
commerce  and  the  opening  up  of  trade  routes  alone 
will  make  workable  and  permanent  European 
institutions  in  Africa.  Education  is  possible  only 
through  missionary  agencies,  and  the  whole  history 
of  Europe  extending  outside  of  Europe  teaches  that 
the  flag  follows  the  cross. 

Is  it  not  significant  that  in  Sierra  Leone,  as  well  as 
in  the  neighboring  republic  of  Liberia,  the  substitu- 
tion of  Islam  for  paganism — so  marked  in  the  last 

28l 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


decade — has  done  more  to  check  the  evil  of  drink, 
to  turn  the  natives  away  from  cannibaHsm  and  to 
reconcile  them  to  the  necessity  of  submitting  to  a 
central  constituted  authority  than  all  the  efforts  of 
French,  British,  and  German  military  and  civil 
officials  ?    How  much  more  could  Christianity  do  ? 

The  Uttoral  between  the  French  Ivory  Coast  and 
German  Togoland,  for  350  miles  along  the  Gulf  of 
Guinea,  is  known  as  the  Gold  Coast  Colony.  Accra, 
the  capital,  has  nearly  twenty  thousand  inhabitants. 
From  Secondee  to  Coomassie,  the  capital  of  Ashanti, 
170  miles  in  the  interior,  there  is  a  railway,  which 
cost  £2,500,000.  Two  other  small  lines,  in  the 
eastern  part  of  the  colony,  will  in  time  reach  the  upper 
valley  of  the  Volta  River,  the  boundary  line  between 
Togoland  and  the  Gold  Coast.  In  the  hinterland  of 
the  Gold  Coast  are  Ashanti  and  the  Northern  Terri- 
tories. 

The  Kingdom  of  Ashanti  was  a  very  recent  British 
Protectorate  at  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  cen- 
tury and  its  wealth  in  gold  mines  and  forests  was  just 
beginning  to  be  realized.  In  1900,  a  new  governor 
of  the  Gold  Coast,  Sir  Frederick  Hodgson,  visiting 
Coomassie,  heard  that  the  Ashanti  had  a  golden  stool 
or  throne.  He  sent  the  police  to  find  it.  The  Ash- 
antis  had  long  been  wanting  to  rebel  against  British 
authority,  and  reinstate  their  King.  This  gave  an 
excellent  reason  for  an  outbreak.  The  Ashantis 
invested  Coomassie,  and  for  several  months  it  was 
believed  that  the  garrison,  who  were  defending  the 
Governor  and  Lady  Hodgson,  would  succumb  before 
help  reached. them.    The  official  party,  with  a  por- 

282 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


tion  of  the  garrison,  managed  to  break  through  the 
besieging  forces  after  several  months,  and  arrived  at 
Accra  nearly  starving  only  a  few  days  before  Coo- 
massie  was  finally  relieved.  The  folly  of  Sir  Freder- 
ick Hodgson  compelled  the  British  to  undertake  a 
regular  war  against  the  Ashantis,  which,  after  a 
summer  campaign,  ended,  as  all  native  wars  must 
end,  in  a  decisive  victory  and  annexation.  Ashanti 
became  British  territory  by  Orders  in  Cotmcil  of 
September  26,  1901,  and  has  since  been  governed  by 
the  administration  of  the  Gold  Coast  Colony. 

When  Ashanti  was  annexed,  another  farther  bit  of 
the  hinterland  was  placed  under  British  protection, 
and  frontiers  arranged  with  Germany  and  France. 
This  is  known  as  the  Northern  Territories,  and  is 
governed  by  a  Commissioner  at  Tamali,  subordinate 
to  the  Governor  of  the  Gold  Coast.  There  are  many 
Mohammedans  in  the  Northern  Territories.  It  is 
believed  that  valuable  gold  mines  may  be  developed 
when  railway  communications  are  estabUshed 
through  the  valley  of  the  White  Volta. 

The  annexation  of  Ashanti  was  the  beginning  of  a 
new  era  for  the  Gold  Coast.  It  gave  impetus  to  the 
railway  construction  to  Coomassie,  which  was  imper- 
ative for  permanent  pacification.  The  railway,  in 
turn,  stimulated  the  gold  industry,  which  grew  in  the 
ten  years  from  1903  to  191 3  from  £100,000  to  over 
£2,000,000.  The  Ashanti  War  cost  £400,000,  which 
was  imposed  upon  the  Ashantis  as  a  debt.  It  in- 
volved the  British  Government  in  1904  in  the  ex- 
penditure, also,  of  nearly  £300,000  in  the  Northern 
Territories. 

283 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Like  Gambia  and  Sierra  Leone,  the  Gold  Coast  is 
proving  a  valuable  market  for  British  trade.  Liver- 
pool supplies  a  substantial  part  of  the  imports. 
Sixty  per  cent,  of  the  carrying  trade  is  under  the 
British  flag.  Trade  doubled  between  1906  and  191 2, 
and  jumped  ten  per  cent,  over  the  figures  of  1912 
during  the  year  before  the  European  War.  Year 
after  year  the  surplus  of  revenue  over  expenditure 
increased  until  it  reached  £200,000  ini9i2.  Ini9i3, 
the  large  accumulated  surpluses  were  spent  in  har- 
bor works,  water  works,  and  sanitation,  and  new 
railway  lines  were  planned  to  the  cocoa  districts. 
In  the  Northern  Territories,  however,  it  was  es- 
timated in  1 9 14  that  many  decades  would  be  required 
before  that  part  of  the  Gold  Coast  paid  its  way. 

As  its  name  implies,  this  region  attracted  Euro- 
peans for  its  mining  wealth.  But  gold  has  been 
exported  since  the  fifteenth  century,. and  the  mines, 
under  present  conditions  of  intensive  development 
and  large  production,  cannot  be  considered  as  a 
permanent  source  of  wealth.  The  British  have  been 
experimenting  in  the  Gold  Coast  and  Ashanti,  as  in 
almost  every  other  African  colony,  in  cotton  growing. 
The  British  Cotton  Growing  Association  sent  experts 
throughout  Africa  in  1903  to  stimulate  a  movement 
that  they  hoped  would  in  time  make  Manchester 
wholly  independent  of  American  cotton.  Although 
the  Ashanti  chiefs  were  reported  to  be  interested,  and 
were  started  in  cotton  growing,  the  propaganda 
cannot  be  said  to  have  succeeded  in  this  part  of 
Africa.  Gold  still  holds  the  premier  place  in  Ashanti 
exports,  and  is  surpassed  in  the  Gold  Coast  only  by 

284 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


cocoa,  which  is  being  grown  on  enormous  and  con- 
stantly enlarged  plantations. 

British  efforts  in  the  Gold  Coast  have  been  stimu- 
lated by  French  and  German  activities  around  the 
colony.  The  remarkable  development  in  gold  min- 
ing, which  has  paid  railway  expenses  and  enabled  the 
colony  to  accumulate  a  surplus,  has  been  very  fortu- 
nate for  those  who  have  been  working  along  lines  of 
agricultural  development.  But  sanitary  conditions 
have  never  been  satisfactory,  and  the  mortality 
among  officials  and  other  Europeans  is  exceedingly 
high.  The  possibilities  of  the  country  are  unlimited, 
if  only  it  can  be  made  habitable  for  Europeans  on  a 
large  scale.  At  present  there  are  less  than  two  thou- 
sand Europeans  in  the  colony,  and  very  few  indeed, 
outside  of  officials  and  missionaries,  in  Ashanti  and 
the  Northern  Territories. 

Little  Togoland  was  easily  conquered  in  the  first 
month  of  the  war  by  the  Gold  Coast  forces,  cooper- 
ating with  the  French.  The  Gold  Coast  Legislative 
Council,  enthusiastically  hopeful  of  keeping  per- 
manently the  German  colony  whose  wonderful  devel- 
opment is  sketched  elsewhere  in  this  book,  offered  to 
pay  the  total  expenses  of  the  conquest,  and  to  con- 
tribute £80,000  to  the  general  war  expenses  of  the 
British  Empire  during  191 6.  If  Togoland  remains  in 
British  possession,  the  Gold  Coast  will  have  not  only 
the  entire  valley  of  the  Volta  River,  but  will  gain 
possession  of  the  thriving  port  of  Lome,  just  beyond 
their  coast  line,  and  the  two  railways  leading  back 
into  the  interior  of  Togo.  Hope  is  expressed  in 
British  Imperialist  circles,  not  only  that  Togoland 

285 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


will  remain  British,  but  also  that  France,  by  receiving 
compensation  elsewhere,  will  be  willing  to  cede 
Dahomey  and  Bordu  to  Great  Britain.  If  Nigeria 
keeps  Kamerun,  and  the  hopes  of  ousting  the  French 
from  Dahomey  be  realized,  Great  Britain  will  be 
master  of  the  whole  of  the  Gulf  of  Guinea  coast  line, 
and  British  West  Africa  will  become  a  colonial  pos- 
session second  to  none  in  Africa. 

Nigeria,  whose  interest  and  importance  to  the 
British  Empire  has  been  realized  only  now  that  the 
dreams  of  the  future  include  the  German  Kamerun, 
is  largely  a  product  of  the  twentieth  century.  The 
British  flag  first  appeared  in  what  has  grown  to  be 
Nigeria,  in  the  little  kingdom  of  Lagos,  which  was 
"bought"  from  a  native  King  more  than  fifty  years 
ago,  after  France  had  begun  to  extend  her  influence 
over  the  neighboring  kingdom  of  Dahomey.  It 
belonged  first  to  Sierra  Leone,  and  then  to  the  Gold 
Coast,  but  was  made  a  separate  colony  in  1886,  after 
the  Germans  had  got  a  foothold  in  Togo  and  Kam- 
erun. Lagos  was  the  nucleus  from  which  the  great 
territory  of  Nigeria  has  been  built.  If  one  glances 
at  the  map,  it  will  be  seen  that  the  hinterland  of  this 
territory  reaches  the  Niger  at  its  second  bend.  Im- 
mediately after  the  colony  and  Protectorate  of  Lagos 
was  constituted,  the  National  African  Company, 
which  had  prevented  the  Germans  from  getting  the 
delta  and  the  lower  valley  of  the  Niger,  obtained  a 
charter  from  the  British  Government  under  the  name 
of  the  Royal  Niger  Company.  The  charter  was  sur- 
rendered in  1899,  and  the  two  Protectorates  of  North- 
ern and  Southern  Nigeria  were  formed  of  its  territories 

286 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


on  January  i,  1900.  Southern  Nigeria  absorbed 
two  smaller  Protectorates,  one  of  which  was  the 
"Oil  Rivers,"  hurriedly  constituted  in  1885  to  pre- 
vent Germany  from  approaching  the  mouth  of  the 
Niger.  In  1906,  Lagos  was  incorporated  in  Southern 
Nigeria,  and  on  January  i,  19 14,  Northern  Nigeria 
was  taken  in,  and  the  whole  Niger  valley  territory 
organized  as  a  colony  and  Protectorate  of  Nigeria.  * 
There  is  a  governor-general,  an  executive  council, 
which  acts  for  the  Protectorate  as  well  as  for  the 
colony,  and  an  advisory  council  with  neither  legisla- 
tive nor  executive  authority. 

The  population  of  Nigeria  is  probably  twenty 
millions,  and  its  area  is  nearly  three  times  that  of  the 
United  Kingdom.  Most  of  the  inhabitants  of  the 
Hausa  States  in  the  northern  Protectorate  are  Mo- 
hammedans, and  the  Islamic  propaganda  has  made 
rapid  strides  south  along  the  valley  of  the  Niger. 
Lake  Chad  is  at  the  northeastern  end  of  Nigeria. 
The  caravan  routes  across  the  desert  lead  to  Tripoli, 
by  which  access  to  the  Mediterranean  is  very  much 
shorter  than  through  Algeria.  So  Nigeria  has  been 
extremely  interested  in  the  development  of  French 
and  Italian  influence  in  North  Africa,  in  the  decline 
of  Ottoman  power,  and  in  the  Pan-Islamic  movement. 
In  regard  to  slavery,  the  same  policy  of  gradual  eman- 
cipation has  been  adopted  as  in  Zanzibar,  and  the 

'  A  special  silver  coinage  for  all  the  West  African  colonies  was  intro- 
duced shortly  before  the  Nigerian  unification.  In  size,  weight,  and 
value  the  coins  correspond  to  those  of  the  United  Kingdom.  The 
reserves  to  guarantee  the  coinage  are  deposited  in  London,  under  the 
control  of  the  West  African  Currency  Board. 

287 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


results  of  fifteen  years  demonstrate  the  value  of  this 
policy  in  doing  away  with  slave-dealing,  if  not  with 
slavery,  among  Moslem  tribes,  who  are  under  Arab 
and  Moslem  influence  and  who  have  fashioned  their 
social  institutions  and  customs  and  laws  by  Moham- 
medan precept  and  example. 

Lagos,  before  the  amalgamation  of  1906,  was  grow- 
ing in  the  same  rapid  way  as  Sierra  Leone  and  Gam- 
bia. In  1905  there  was  an  excess  of  revenue  over 
expenditure  of  £30,000.  Lagos  is  another  illustra- 
tion of  the  profit  British  manufacturers  and  mer- 
chants and  shippers  derive  from  colonies.  For  Lagos 
in  1905  took  over  seventy-five  per  cent,  of  her  imports 
from  Great  Britain.  The  Colonial  Loans'  Act  of 
1899  enabled  Lagos  to  secure  the  money  for  a  railway 
into  the  interior,  which  has  since  been  extended  to 
Jebba  on  the  second  bend  of  the  Niger  River,  and 
connects  there  by  ferry  with  the  line  from  Kano  to 
the  Niger. 

The  1905  report  of  Lagos  admitted  that  much 
of  the  revenue  was  derived  from  spirits  duties,  but 
declared  that  the  importation  of  spirits  could  not  be 
prohibited  without  seriously  dislocating  the  finances 
of  the  colony.  The  growing  sentiment  against 
alcohol  in  Great  Britain,  and  the  belief  that  African 
natives  were  being  demoralized  by  rum,  led  to  agita- 
tion in  Evangelical  Church  circles  and  among  Non- 
conformists. Missionary  reports  and  speeches  of 
missionaries  home  on  furlough  did  much  to  deepen 
the  conviction  that  an  enlightened  Christian  nation 
should  not  abolish  slavery  and  introduce  civilization 
in  Africa  only  to  demoralize  the  frecdmen  with  the 

288 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


curse  of  Anglo-Saxondom.  After  the  coming  of  the 
Liberal  Government  to  power  in  the  General  Elec- 
tion of  1906,  a  victory  won  by  Nonconformist  votes, 
political  pressure  was  brought  upon  the  Colonial 
Office  to  investigate  the  liquor  traffic  in  West  Africa. 
In  December,  1908,  a  committee  was  appointed  to 
go  to  Nigeria  for  this  purpose. 

The  findings  of  the  committee  were  very  different 
from  the  representations  of  some  travelers  and  all 
missionaries.  The  committee  reported  that  in 
Southern  Nigeria  spirits  furnished  twenty-two  per 
cent,  of  the  total  imports  and  provided  fifty  per  cent, 
of  the  revenue.  Rum  paid  two  hundred  per  cent, 
and  gin  three  hundred  per  cent.  duty.  But  the 
merchants  engaged  in  liquor  importation  were  almost 
exclusively  Dutch  and  German,  and  the  spirits  came 
chiefly  from  Rotterdam  and  Hamburg.  The  Com- 
mission stated  that  the  standard  of  sobriety  in 
Southern  Nigeria  was  much  higher  than  in  Great 
Britain,  and  concluded  that  "there  is  absolutely  no 
evidence  of  race  deterioration  due  to  drink  .  .  . 
hardly  any  alcoholic  disease  among  the  native  popu- 
lation, and  with  the  exception  of  one  or  two  isolated 
cases,  we  found  no  connection  between  crime  and 
drink."  But  the  agitation  continued.  The  Colonial 
Secretary  was  asked  to  extend  the  Sierra  Leone  sys- 
tem of  local  option  throughout  the  West  African 
Colonies,  and  to  make  illegal  the  use  of  gin  as  cur- 
rency and  the  practice  of  pawning  children  for  gin. 
He  gave  a  non-committal  reply. 

It  is  extremely  difficult  to  come  to  a  definite  con- 
clusion on  this  subject,  of  which  one  hears  and  reads 
19  289 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


so  much.  On  the  one  hand,  it  is  easy  to  believe  that 
those  who  are  anxious  to  preserve  the  equiHbrium 
of  budgets  are  very  greatly,  if  unconsciously,  influ- 
enced in  their  attitude  toward  a  question  of  this  kind 
by  their  desire  not  to  lose  a  vital  item  of  revenue. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  must  be  remembered  that  the 
missionaries  consider  drinking  a  sin,  wholly  repre- 
hensible in  itself,  and  are  apt  to  exaggerate — un- 
consciously also — the  evil  effects  of  a  practice  they 
condemn  on  principle. 

The  conquest  of  the  hinterland  of  Nigeria  occupied 
a  period  of  five  years,  from  1901  to  1906,  and  is  one 
of  the  most  remarkable  feats  ever  accomplished  by  a 
British  colonial  administrator.  Sir  Frederick  Lugard 
not  only  had  to  work  with  inadequate  military  and 
civil  establishments  and  with  grants  far  below  his 
needs,  but  he  was  also  hampered  by  the  same  laissez 
aller  policy  of  the  Home  Government  which  rendered 
the  situation  in  Somaliland  so  difficult  during  the 
same  period.  If  he  had  depended  upon  guidance 
and  advice  from  London,  and  had  not  possessed 
initiative  to  an  extraordinary  degree,  France  and 
Germany  inight  have  cut  the  British  off  from  Lake 
Chad,  occupied  theYola  Province  on  the  River  Benue, 
and  anticipated  the  British  in  establishing  a  pro- 
tectorate over  the  Hausa  States.'  On  the  other 
hand,  the  task  of  extending  British  sovereignty  over 
the  hinterland  received  powerful  support  from  Im- 
periahsts  and  from  local  sentiment  in  the  Lagos 

'  A  portion  of  the  area,  polentially  British  through  the  enterprise 
of  Sir  Frederick  and  his  associates,  was  sacrificed  by  the  compensa- 
tions to  France  in  the  Anglo-French  Agreement  of  1904. 

290 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


and  Southern  Nigeria  colonies.  France  and  Great 
Britain  were  bitter  rivals,  and  Germany  was  begin- 
ning to  develop  the  neighboring  Kamerun  in  what 
was,  from  the  British  Imperialist  point  of  view,  "an 
alarming  manner. " 

Nigeria  had  to  lend  troops  to  the  Gold  Coast  for 
the  relief  of  Coomassie  and  the  subsequent  Ashanti 
campaign.  As  soon  as  they  came  back,  a  vigorous 
forward  policy  was  decided  upon.  For  France  was 
still  smarting  from  the  humiliation  of  the  Fashoda 
affair,  and  determined  to  make  as  much  as  possible 
out  of  her  paramoimt  position  in  the  Upper  Niger 
Valley  and  in  the  eastern  Sahara  and  Sudan.  Her 
aim  was  to  have  Lake  Chad  wholly  French  and  to 
limit  by  anticipation  the  British  and  German  pene- 
tration north  and  northeast  from  the  Gulf  of  Guinea. 
Against  the  British,  the  French  plan  was  to  get  con- 
trol of  the  valley  of  the  Sokoto  River  from  the  border 
of  the  desert  to  its  junction  with  the  Niger,  and  also 
to  control  the  whole  basin  of  the  Komadugu  Waube 
running  along  the  southern  edge  of  the  desert  east- 
ward into  Lake  Chad.  They  entered  what  the 
British  claimed  was  their  "sphere"  and  nearly  pre- 
cipitated a  second  Fashoda  crisis  by  killing  an 
English  officer.  But  at  the  same  time,  the  troops 
who  had  come  back  from  Ashanti  overthrew  the 
Emirs  of  Kontagoro  and  Beda,  two  of  the  most 
powerful  feudatories  of  the  Sokoto  Empire.  During 
the  autumn  of  1901,  the  province  of  Yola,  in  the 
Upper  Benue  Valley,  which  the  Germans  coveted, 
was  brought  under  administrative  control,  and  a 
resident  placed  at  Yola. 

291 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


In  1902  the  diplomacy  that  foreshadowed  the 
Anglo-French  Agreement  of  1904  was  initiated.  It 
was  decided  to  make  a  delimitation  of  French  and 
British  spheres  south  of  the  Sahara,  to  determine  the 
Lake  Chad  boundaries,  and  to  modify — or  rather  to 
make  more  precise — the  Convention  of  1899  in 
regard  to  the  Sudan  spheres  of  influence.  As  the 
French  were  claiming  a  frontier  from  the  Niger  to 
Lake  Chad,  which  would  give  them  access  to  the 
Benue  River,  thus  shutting  the  British  off  entirely 
from  Lake  Chad,  the  Nigerian  officials  sought  to 
make  effective  their  occupation  of  this  region. 
Their  success  depended  upon  the  acceptance  by  the 
Emir  of  Kano  of  the  British  Protectorate  that  Sir 
Frederick  asserted  his  predecessor  had  agreed  to. 
The  Emir  proved  recalcitrant  and  refused  the  bribes 
of  British  agents.  Sir  Frederick  announced  that 
the  only  possible  policy  for  the  future  of  Nigeria  was 
to  include  in  the  Protectorate  of  Northern  Nigeria 
the  entire  territories  of  the  Hausa  States.  In  spite 
of  the  lukewarmness  of  the  Colonial  Office,  he  pre- 
cipitated a  conflict  with  the  Emir  of  Kano  and  other 
Sokoto  vassals  in  1903.  Sokoto  was  occupied  on 
March  15th,  and,  after  much  difficulty  and  one  seri- 
ous reverse,  the  Emir  of  Kano  was  tracked  and 
killed  in  June.  Less  than  one  thousand  men  were 
at  Sir  Frederick  Lugard's  disposal,  but  with  them  he 
was  able  to  include  the  entire  Sultanate  of  Sokoto  in 
Nigeria,  and  to  bring  the  British  sphere  up  to  the  edge 
of  the  Sahara. 

The  Anglo-French  Agreement  of  1904  compounded 
the  rivalry  with  France.    But  there  was  still  much 

292 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


work  to  be  done  to  pacify  the  territories  left  to  the 
British.  For  several  years  after  Lugard's  resigna- 
tion, there  was  much  fighting.  Emirs  who  proved 
refractory  were  killed  or  deposed.  On  the  Anglo- 
German  frontier,  Germans  and  British  combined  to 
subdue  the  resistance  of  remote  tribes,  and  in  the 
north  those  who  resisted  the  European  penetration 
were  caught  and  crushed  between  British  and  French. 
After  the  Europeans  came  to  an  understanding, 
resistance  on  the  part  of  the  Africans  was  hopeless. 

The  railway  from  the  Niger  was  pushed  on  to 
Kano.  The  British  worked  in  the  organization  of 
Northern  Nigeria  through  the  local  emirs.  By 
respecting  their  customs  and  laws,  and  by  granting 
civil  lists  to  the  emirs  and  fixed  salaries  to  native 
officials,  the  loyalty  of  the  "protected"  to  the  "pro- 
tectors" was  established  upon  the  solid  basis  of 
financial  interest.  In  1910,  Sir  Frederick's  successor 
in  Northern  Nigeria  held  a  court  at  Kano,  to  which 
the  emirs  came  from  long  distances.  Fourteen 
thousand  native  cavalry  formed  his  escort.  An 
Imperial  proclamation  declared  the  land  of  the  Pro- 
tectorate under  the  control  of  and  at  the  disposition 
of  the  Crown,  in  order  that  natives  might  be  assured 
of  their  rights  to  the  land  and  to  forest  produce.' 
In  191 1,  when  the  railway  to  Kano  was  completed, 
the  Government  claimed  that  unarmed  Europeans 
and  natives  could  now  travel  with  perfect  security 
from  one  end  of  Northern  Nigeria  to  the  other.  In 

» It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Great  Britain  showed  her  good  faith 
in  the  controversy  with  Belgium,  which  was  acute  at  this  time,  by 
doing  in  Nigeria  what  she  asked  Belgium  to  do  in  the  Congo. 

293 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


191 2,  Sir  Frederick  Lugard  returned  to  amalgamate 
the  northern  and  southern  Protectorate  and  the 
colony.  He  held  a  Durbar  at  Kano  on  New  Year's 
Day,  1913,  which  was  attended  by  emirs  and  chiefs 
representing  sixty-eight  tribes,  loyal  and  contented 
under  British  rule. 

While  Northern  Nigeria  was  being  penetrated  and 
conquered,  Southern  Nigeria  increased  in  prosperity 
every  year.  After  the  inclusion  of  the  Lagos  colony, 
Southern  Nigeria  was  more  than  self-supporting. 
In  1908,  there  was  a  revenue  surplus  of  over  £200,000 
and  grants  from  the  Imperial  Government  had  been 
discontinued.  The  revenue  had  doubled  in  five 
years,  and  the  sound  financial  condition  of  the  colony 
made  possible  the  issue  of  a  loan  of  £3,000,000  at 
four  per  cent,  for  harbor  works  and  railway  construc- 
tion. 1910  brought  an  increase  of  £350,000  revenue 
(25  per  cent.)  over  1909,  and  trade  increased  £2,- 
000,000.  The  tin  mining  area  in  exploitation  had 
tripled.  One  ton  of  tin  was  exported  in  1903:  fifteen 
hundred  tons  in  1912.  In  1913,  it  was  reported  that 
the  total  trade  of  Southern  Nigeria  had  more  than 
doubled  in  six  years,  and  that  the  surplus  of  revenue 
had  reached  £120,000.  In  1914  the  Colonial  Office 
was  able  to  reduce  railway  rates  and  the  scale  of  tin 
mining  royalties. 

Although  during  the  same  period  Northern  Nigeria 
was  still  costing  much  more  than  it  brought  in, 
it  was  considered  wise,  as  in  the  case  of  Sierra  Leone, 
to  unite  the  Northern  Protectorate  with  the  prosper- 
ous colony  and  Southern  Protectorate.  Hinterland 
development  would  mean  prosperity  for  the  coast. 

294 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


The  coast  had  every  reason,  then,  to  be  glad  to  con- 
tribute to  that  development,  and  to  supervise  and 
manage  it. 

On  January  I,  1914,  the  vmion  was  effected,  and  the 
public  debt  unified.  In  view  of  the  war  that  followed 
so  soon,  with  the  long  and  arduous  campaign  that 
had  to  be  undertaken  against  Kamerun,  union  came 
at  a  most  fortunate  moment. 

In  Nigeria  as  in  the  Sudan,  East  Africa,  Uganda 
and  Nyasaland,  the  first  decade  of  the  twentieth 
century  was  marked  by  an  extraordinary  interest  in 
cotton-growing  experimentation.  In  1902  a  move- 
ment was  begun,  backed  by  money  and  specialists 
from  the  British  Cotton-Growing  Association,  to 
make  cotton  the  staple  industry  of  British  West 
Africa.  Ginning  mills  were  erected  and  premiums 
offered — in  many  cases  facilities  for  loans  granted  to 
those  who  were  willing  to  undertake  the  cultivation 
of  cotton.  For  several  years  there  was  much  enthusi- 
asm. In  spite  of  some  failures  in  1906,  cotton  cul- 
tivation was  believed  to  be  the  great  industry  of  the 
future.  Mr.  Winston  Churchill  evidently  believed 
of  West  Africa  what  he  had  said  of  East  Africa  during 
and  after  his  trip  from  Mombasa  to  Cairo  overland. 
When  the  bill  for  the  Kano  railway  was  introduced 
in  1907,  Mr.  ChurchiU  told  Parliament  that  this  rail- 
way would  mean  the  development  of  a  new  cotton- 
growing  area  which  was  going  to  save  Lancashire  from 
dependence  upon  the  United  States!     It  was  a  typi- 

'  Sir  Gilbert  Parker  remarked  that  the  commercial  uses  of  the  Kano 
railway,  as  Mr.  Churchill  exposed  them,  made  the  bill  inconsistent 
with  the  free  trade  policy  of  the  Government.    Mr.  Churchill  rc- 

295 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


cally  Churchill  utterance,  very  much  like  later 
combined  boasts  and  prophecies  about  the  defense 
of  Antwerp,  dragging  the  Germans  out  of  Wilhelms- 
haven  like  rats,  and  walking  across  the  Gallipoli 
peninsula  to  Constantinople.  Cotton  is  not  exactly 
a  failure  in  Nigeria,  but  the  promises  and  hopes  of 
1907  have  certainly  remained  unfulfilled.  Only 
£150,000  of  cotton  was  exported  in  1913,  less  than 
one-thirtieth  of  the  value  of  the  palm-oil  export. 
Tin,  which  just  began  to  be  a  Nigerian  industry  in 
the  year  of  Mr.  Churchill 's  speech,  was  an  export 
four  times  the  value  of  cotton  in  191 3. 

For  all  this,  the  activities  of  the  British  Cotton- 
Growing  Association  bear  watching  on  the  part  of 
the  United  States :  and  the  progress  of  cotton  cultiva- 
tion in  Africa  and  in  Asiatic  Turkey  foreshadow  a 
time — perhaps  not  far  distant — when  Europe  will 
no  longer  need  the  cotton  of  our  Southern  States. 
The  cotton-manufacturing  industry  in  America  ought 
to  be  developed  along  with  the  cotton-growing  in- 
dustry in  Africa.  When  the  day  arrives  that  Lan- 
cashire will  no  longer  need  our  raw  material,  we  must 
be  in  the  position  no  longer  to  need  Lancashire's 
manufactured  goods. 

This  summary  review  of  the  history  of  Nigeria  is 
sufficient  to  indicate  the  secret  of  British  success  in 
African  colonization.  It  is  in  the  character  of  the 
men  entrusted  with  colonial  administration,  their 
enterprise,  their  vision,  their  ability  to  conciliate, 


plied  that  there  was  a  wide  difference  between  improving  trafiBc 
communications  and  erecting  a  tariff  wall. 

296 


THE  BRITISH  IN  WEST  AFRICA 

and  make  happy  the  natives  whom  they  have  sub- 
dued. Up  to  the  present  time,  England  has  fur- 
nished the  unique  example  of  a  nation  able  to  utilize 
its  best  talent  in  the  building  of  an  overseas  Empire. 
Napoleon  was  not  wrong  when  he  called  the  English 
a  nation  of  shopkeepers.  They  are  merchants  par 
excellence,  and  their  foreign  policy  has  been  dictated 
ever  since  the  days  of  Cromwell  b}''  purely  commercial 
considerations.  They  spend  their  money  and  they 
sacrifice  the  blood  of  their  people  only  when  they 
know  it  is  going  to  pay  them  to  do  so.  But  by  a 
curious  paradox,  the  men  who  have  made  Great 
Britain  the  premier  commercial  nation  of  the  world 
have  been  led  into  the  work  of  building  the  Empire 
because  they  themselves  looked  down  upon  and 
scorned  to  enter  trade.  Just  as  in  feudal  days  the 
fighting  men  purchased  the  right  to  a  place  above 
their  fellows  and  became  the  aristocracy  by  being 
willing  to  take  the  risk  and  the  burden  of  defending 
the  peasants  of  the  field  and  the  artisans  of  the  city, 
so  up  to  the  present  time  the  British  aristocracy  has 
preserved  its  caste  and  its  privileges  by  devoting 
its  energies  and  its  brains  and  its  blood  to  the  enrich- 
ment and  protection  of  traders  and  manufacturers. 
The  Liverpool  and  London  merchant  and  the  Man- 
chester and  Sheffield  manufacturer  grows  rich.  The 
Liverpool  and  London  ship-owner  grows  rich.  He  is 
perfectly  willing  to  take  off  his  hat  to  the  military 
and  naval  officers  and  the  colonial  administrators 
who  are  making  possible  his  prosperity.  In  the  city 
and  in  the  country  he  yields  precedence  to  the  no- 
bility and  the  county  families.    Their  children  are 

297 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


sacrificing  themselves  for  his  children.  When  he 
teaches  his  son  the  mysteries  of  the  bank  balance,  he 
teaches  him  at  the  same  time  what  is  due  to  those 
who  make  that  bank  balance  possible.  Why  not? 
As  long  as  he  is  content  with  the  station  of  life  to 
which  God  has  called  him,  and  his  "betters"  are 
content  with  theirs,  why  not  indeed? 

Perhaps  the  war  is  going  to  change  all  this.  But  if 
it  does,  it  will  change  the  colonies  also. 


298 


CHAPTER  XV 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 

ON  the  north  side  of  the  Gtilf  of  Guinea,  Ger- 
many is  ensconced  in  a  narrow  strip  of 
territory  called  Togoland.  This  colony, 
with  Great  Britain's  Gold  Coast  colony,  is  an  en- 
clave in  French  territory  between  Dahomey  and  the 
Ivory  Coast.  The  German  boundary  on  the  west 
with  Great  Britain  is  partly  formed  by  the  Volta 
River.  On  the  east,  the  Mono  River  divides  Togo- 
land  from  Dahomey.  Both  with  France  and  Great 
Britain  the  lateral  boundaries  of  the  hinterland  are 
conventional  lines  not  exactly  defined.  Togoland 
has  very  Httle  coastline.  For  Great  Britain  holds 
both  sides  of  the  Volta  River  and  its  mouth,  including 
all  of  Cape  St.  Paul,  and  France  holds  Great  Popo 
Island.  Lome,  the  railway  terminus  of  Togoland,  is 
as  much  at  the  mercy  of  the  British,  as  Swakopmund, 
the  terminus  of  German  Southwest  African  railways. 

On  the  west  side  of  the  Gulf  of  Guinea,  between 
British  Nigeria  and  French  Gabun,  Germany  has  the 
large  colony  of  Kamerun,  with  an  extensive  coastline 
that  includes  most  of  the  Bight  of  Biafra.  Kamerun 
extends  north  to  Lake  Chad  in  a  narrow  wedge 
between  the  Shari  and  Ycdscran  rivers,  and  south- 

299 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


east  to  the  Congo  in  two  wedges  cutting  through 
French  Equatorial  Africa.  Rio  Muni,  or  Spanish 
Guinea,  is  a  little  enclave  in  Kamerun,  on  the  east 
side  of  the  Gulf  of  Guinea,  not  far  from  the  Franco- 
German  border.  The  island  of  Fernando  Po  off 
the  Kamerun  coast,  in  the  Bight  of  Biafra,  is  also 
Spanish  territory.  Since  France  has  by  treaty  the 
right  of  preemption  to  Spain's  African  colonies, 
Germany  has  been  in  Kamerun,  as  elsewhere,  not 
wholly  master  of  her  own  destinies. 

Togoland  was  neglected  by  France  and  Great 
Britain,  although  they  had  established  themselves 
prior  to  the  time  when  Germany  began  to  have 
colonial  ambitions  at  several  points  along  the  coast. 
There  was  just  one  wee  opening  for  the  Germans  on 
the  coast,  Little  Popo  Island,  on  which  German  mer- 
chants had  established  factories  in  order  to  escape 
the  duties  levied  by  the  British  on  the  Gold  Coast. 
The  chief  from  whom  these  Germans  had  obtained 
concessions  died  opportunely  in  1883,  and  the  dispute 
over  his  succession  gave  the  German  Consul  for 
West  Africa  the  chance  to  slip  in  and  hoist  the  German 
flag.  By  exploration  of  the  hinterland,  and  succes- 
sive treaties  with  tribal  chiefs,  a  wider  interior  came 
under  German  sovereignty.  In  1897  and  1899, 
treaties  with  France  and  Great  Britain  settled  the 
general  Hmits  and  the  international  status  of  the 
colony.  The  natives  were  brought  under  adminis- 
trative control  with  much  less  difificulty  than  France 
experienced  in  Dahomey  and  Great  Britain  in 
Ashanti.  In  1900,  a  military  force  of  seven  Germans 
and  150  natives  was  all  the  colony  needed. 

300 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


In  the  early  days  of  the  colony,  Germany  received 
a  decided  setback  from  the  fact  that  France  was  able 
to  make  good  her  claim  to  Great  Popo  Island,  which 
controls  the  larger  portion  of  the  coast.  But  the  Ger- 
mans consoled  themselves  for  this  political  setback 
by  starting  commercial  development  of  Little  Popo 
and  the  Togo  hinterland  on  a  remarkably  successful 
basis.  Almost  from  the  beginning  they  were  able  to 
substitute  cash  payments  for  barter  to  the  great  satis- 
faction and  advantage  of  the  natives.  They  put  their 
minds,  also,  on  the  problem  of  getting  out  of  the  palm 
oil  and  palm  nut  industries  all  there  was  in  them.  So 
they  were  soon  able  to  control  the  greater  part  of  the 
Dahomey  production.  By  estabhshing  regular  steam- 
ship service  and  by  being  able  to  offer  a  higher  price 
for  palm  products,  they  succeeded  in  making  Ham- 
burg the  depot  for  Dahomey  as  well  as  for  Togoland.  * 

Togoland  is  one  of  the  few  happy  colonics  in  Africa 
without  a  military  and  pohtical  history.  Both  from 
the  administrative  and  economic  point  of  view,  the 
colony  was  well  organized  and  on  the  way  to  self- 
support  at  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century. 
By  1905,  a  coast  railway  was  completed  from  Little 
Popo  to  Lome.  In  the  next  five  years  two  railways 
were  built  into  the  interior  from  Lome,  and  surveys 
have  since  been  made  to  extend  the  Lome-Atakpame 
line  to  the  very  north  of  the  colony.^    Lome,  Uke 

'  See  below,  pp. 

'Togoland  has  had  the  common  experience  of  colonies  which 
keep  railways  and  other  public  works  in  their  own  hands.  Railway 
receipts  in  1912  were  seventy  per  cent,  in  excess  of  running  expenses. 
After  interest  charges  were  paid  and  depreciation  reserve  laid  aside, 
the  profit  to  the  colonial  budget  was  considerable. 

301 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Swakopmund,  Luderitzberg,  and  Dar-es-Salaam, 
represents  Germany  at  her  best  in  Africa.  In  build- 
ings, public  works,  and  sanitation  Lome  is  the  model 
city  of  the  West  African  coast. 

Germany  has  outstripped  other  colonizing  powers 
in  Africa  in  four  things,  all  of  which  are  strikingly 
illustrated  in  the  little  colony  of  Togoland:  road- 
btiilding  for  cooperation  with  railways  and  transport; 
accommodation  for  travelers  in  the  interior;  scienti- 
fic forestry ;  and  supervision  of  public  health. 

In  a  quarter  of  a  century,  with  very  limited  means 
at  their  disposal,  the  Germans  have  built  750  miles 
of  roads  over  which  motor  cars  can  run.  Every 
mile  has  been  placed  to  feed  communities  whose 
products  for  export  justify  the  money  put  into  the 
road.  Nowhere  in  Africa,  where  white  colonists 
are  lacking,  are  the  natives  so  well  served  in  the  way 
of  roads  as  in  Togoland.  One  can  say  the  same  of 
conveniences  for  travelers.  Togoland  is  unique  in 
its  rest-houses  for  Europeans  and  for  natives.  At 
the  end  of  the  day's  journey,  one  can  always  be  sure 
of  a  comfortable  place  to  sleep,  where  cleanliness  is 
invariable.  From  personal  experience  on  the  Bag- 
dad Railway  in  Asia  Minor,  I  can  testify  to  the  joy 
the  traveler  finds  in  the  modest  little  hotels  that  go 
with  the  German  wherever  he  penetrates.  In  sharp 
contrast  to  the  uncomfortable  and  filthy  native 
accommodations  in  the  Near  East  and  in  Africa  are 
the  clean  beds  and  rooms  and  the  wholesome  food  of 
the  German  inns. 

None  accuses  Germany  of  not  having  got  the  most, 
from  the  European  standpomt,  out  of  the  colonics  she 

302 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


possessed  in  Africa.  We  have  spoken  above  of  Dr. 
Rohrbach's  report  about  the  possibiHties  of  Southwest 
Africa  for  cattle-raising,  and  the  generous  assist- 
ance given  by  the  Government  to  encourage  stock- 
breeding.  In  Togoland,  the  problem  of  forestation 
has  received  long  and  intensive  study,  and  been  the 
subject  of  reports,  that  have  aided  immensely  the 
officials  of  other  colonizing  Powers.  Herr  Metzger, 
Forestry  Superintendent  of  Togoland,  found  that 
sixty  per  cent,  of  Togoland  was  covered  by  non- 
productive growth,  due  to  wasteful  methods  of  the 
natives  through  many  centuries.  The  reclamation  of 
that  land,  and  the  better  yielding  of  the  forty  per 
cent,  under  cultivation  and  virgin  forest,  was  one  of 
the  principal  ambitions  of  the  Togoland  Government. 
Mahogany  was  scientifically  grown  to  a  certain  ex- 
tent; but  the  marvelous  development  was  in  teak, 
which  thrives  everywhere.  As  in  Hungary  and  Bul- 
garia, German  forestry  experts  were  reconstructing 
the  forests  by  planting  seedlings. 

What  the  Germans  accomplished  in  educating  the 
natives  in  preventive  medicine,  and  in  caring  for 
their  personal  and  communal  health  and  cleanliness, 
is  marvelous.  Not  only  were  Government  officials 
tireless  in  preaching  the  value  of  keeping  clean,  being 
vaccinated,  burning  or  burying  refuse,  making  a  war 
on  the  fly  and  the  mosquito,  and  other  matters  that 
are  still  not  fully  appreciated  in  many  parts  of  Europe, 
but  they  enlisted  the  cooperation  of  paramount  and 
local  chiefs  to  an  extent  unknown  elsewhere  in  Africa. 
The  fight  against  malaria,  yellow  fever,  sleeping- 
sickness,  skin  diseases,  and  tuberculosis,  was  carried 

303 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


on  with  unremitting  vigilance  and  enthusiasm.  The 
greatest  success  was  in  vaccination.  Smallpox  is 
the  most  dreaded  scourge  of  the  country.  The 
German  propaganda  made  the  native  so  alive  to  the 
value  of  vaccination  that  they  came  and  asked  for  it 
and  many  paramount  chiefs  established  compulsory 
vaccination  by  law. 

In  the  same  week  that  Dr.  Nachtigal  hoisted  the 
German  flag  in  Togoland,  he  succeeded  in  getting  a 
foothold  on  the  Kamerun  coast  by  making  treaties 
with  native  chiefs.  He  outwitted  the  commander  of 
an  English  gunboat,  who  had  proceeded  to  the  Gulf 
of  Guinea  to  prevent  the  Germans  from  getting  a 
foothold  there.  Almost  a  year  of  discussion  between 
the  London,  Paris,  and  Berlin  Foreign  Offices  fol- 
lowed. Great  Britain  and  France  both  had  claims 
to  footholds  on  the  Kamerun  coast. ,  But  Germany 
advanced  similar  claims  to  footholds  at  the  mouth  of 
the  Niger  and  at  Konakry,  in  French  Guinea.  Ger- 
man, French,  and  British  claims  all  rested  on  shadowy 
foundations.  If  one  be  admitted,  the  others  were 
equally  good.  As  Germany's  claim  at  the  mouth  of 
the  Niger  was  just  like  the  claim  by  which  the  British 
at  that  time  were  hoping  to  oust  the  Portuguese  from 
Delagoa  Bay,  London  thought  it  best  to  make  a 
treaty  with  Berlin,  recognizing  Germany  in  Kamerun 
in  return  for  German  recognition  of  British  rights  in 
Nigeria.  France  ceded  Great  Batanga  to  Germany 
in  return  for  Konakry. 

For  fifteen  years  not  much  was  done  by  British 
and  Germans  to  develop  the  hinterland  between 
Nigeria  and   Kamerun   and   Lake   Chad.  Great 

304 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


Britain  and  Germany  got  busy  only  when  they  saw 
the  French  trying  to  put  the  whole  Lake  Chad  region 
under  the  French  flag.  In  1902,  Germany  and  Great 
Britain  cooperated  in  a  military  and  surveying 
expedition  along  their  common  frontier  with  the 
object  of  fixing  boundaries.  The  underlying  motive 
was,  of  course,  to  prevent  the  French  from  getting 
into  the  Bomu  country,  between  their  colonies  and 
Lake  Chad.  Nigerian  and  Kamerun  authorities 
were  in  perfect  accord,  and  the  official  reports  of 
1903  are  much  in  the  nature  of  a  mutual  admiration 
society.  The  object  of  cooperation  was  accompHshed. 
Native  tribes  were  "pacified,"  and  at  the  beginning 
of  1904  France  saw  that  she  had  to  accept  Britain 
and  Germany  as  neighbors  on  Lake  Chad.  British 
and  German  authority  was  firmly  established  in 
Nigeria  and  Kamerun  in  1904  from  the  coast  to  Lake 
Chad.  The  definite  Anglo-German  boundary  was 
not  fixed  until  1913 — except  at  the  farther  unknown 
Lake  Chad  end.  That  was  the  only  part  of  the  game 
which  needed  hurry  and  an  understanding.  That 
the  British  Cabinet  did  not  hesitate,  even  after 
pourparlers  were  under  way,  to  continue  to  work  with 
Germany  in  Morocco  and  to  seek  German  aid  in  doing 
France  out  of  her  "legitimate  rights"  to  Bomu  is 
one  of  the  factors  in  causing  France  to  yield  a  few 
points  she  was  holding  out  for  in  making  the  agree- 
ment with  Great  Britain.  The  Anglo-French  Agree- 
ment of  1904  was  business  from  beginning  to  end. 
There  was  no  sentiment  in  it — except  in  retrospect. 

Germany  had  much  trouble  with  native  outbreaks 
in  Kamerun.    The  hinterland  is  vast  and  mountain- 

ao  305 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ous  and  does  not  possess  navigable  waterways  such 
as  the  British  have  in  Nigeria.  Military  and  ad- 
ministrative expenses  were  very  heavy.  But  mahog- 
any, ebony,  ivory,  rubber,  and  cultivated  products 
made  the  colony  actually  as  well  as  potentially  one  of 
great  wealth.  Kamerun  is  a  splendid  rubber  coun- 
try. The  Germans  looked  at  the  rubber  question 
from  a  broad  scientific  standpoint,  keeping  always  in 
mind  the  future.  Private  concessionnaires,  with  their 
killing  off  of  rubber  trees  and  rubber  gatherers,  have 
not  been  allowed  to  give  Kamerun  the  bad  name 
of  adjacent  French  and  Belgian  territory.  Cocoa 
plantations  doubled  between  1908  and  1913.  Timber 
export  nearly  quintupled  in  the  same  period.  Mining 
industries,  being  wholly  dependent  upon  transport, 
are  not  developed:  although  many  minerals  exist. 
The  colony  found  fortune  enough  in  forest  and 
agricultural  produce. 

Kamerun  territory  was  substantially  increased, 
and  given  an  outlet  in  two  places  to  the  Congo  River, 
by  the  "compensations"  granted  by  France  in  ex- 
change for  the  recognition  of  the  Protectorate  over 
Morocco.  The  New  Kamerun  was  enthusiastically 
and  glowingly  depicted  to  the  German  people  by 
those  who  had  to  justify  the  Agadir  coup  and  its 
aftermath.  But  the  Reichstag  thought  very  little 
of  the  diplomacy  of  the  Foreign  Office  and  the  results 
accomplished  by  it.  Almost  immediately  after  the 
Congo  territories  were  ceded  by  France,  Germany  had 
native  troubles,  which  compelled  the  establishing  of 
garrisons  and  the  expenseof  a  large  punitiveexpedition. 

Before  Germany  adopted  a  colonial  policy,  backed 

306 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


by  popular  support,  there  was  maladministration  in 
Togoland  and  Kamerun,  involving  the  governors  of 
both  colonies.  In  1905,  native  chiefs  of  Kamerun 
protested  directly  to  Berlin  against  the  system  of 
government  of  Von  Puttkamer.  To  prove  their 
charges,  the  Kamerun  chiefs  presented  a  register  of 
arbitrary  acts  committed  by  the  governor  and  his 
subordinates.  These  were  numerous  well-authenti- 
cated cases  of  brutality  and  administrative  oppres- 
sion. The  whole  matter  was  aired  in  the  German 
press  and  in  the  Reichstag.  The  governors  were 
recalled  and  tried.  Both  were  found  guilty  of  mal- 
administration, and  one  of  cruelty.  Popular  indigna- 
tion was  as  great  as  at  the  time  of  the  Peters  trial. ' 
Had  there  been  no  strong,  irresistible  public  opinion, 
aroused  by  the  appeal  of  the  chiefs  and  the  presenta- 
tion of  their  pathetic  evidence,  the  governors  would 
have  escaped  trial.  For  Berlin  bureaucracy  went 
to  the  extent  of  destroying  documents  on  file  in  the 
desire  to  save  the  culprits.  The  scandal  led  to  the 
resignation  of  Prince  Hohenlohe,  and  the  abolition 
of  the  disastrous  system  of  entrusting  the  manage- 

'  Dr.  Peters,  like  Stanley  and  other  famous  African  explorers, 
was  charged  with  the  most  unbelievable  cruelties  to  natives  in  the 
course  of  his  trips  in  Central  Africa.  Stanley  was  never  brought  to 
book,  as  was  Peters,  but  I  have  been  assured  by  the  Countess 
di  Villamarina,  whose  first  husband  was  a  scientist  who  died  on  one 
of  Stanley's  trips,  that  her  husband's  diary  gave  irrefutable  proof 
of  Stanley's  heartrending  brutality.  The  mania  to  torture  natives 
seems  to  attack  often  the  white  man  in  the  jungle.  It  is  a  mental 
malady.  Wliatever  might  be  said  in  extenuation  of  explorers  or  of 
lonely  officials  in  remote  posts,  who  become  neurasthenic  and  lose 
their  grip,  there  is  no  possible  excuse  for  a  governor  of  a  colony  who 
allows  excesses  to  go  on  unpunished  under  a  civil  administration. 

3"7 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ment  of  the  colonies  to  aristocrats  and  bureaucrats. 
Dr.  Dernberg,  a  bank  manager,  succeeded  Hohenlohe. 
The  General  Election  brought  to  the  new  business 
management  of  the  colonies  Reichstag  support.  It 
was  the  beginning  of  a  new  era. 

Like  the  British  and  French,  the  Germans  had 
great  hopes  of  finding  a  source  of  cotton  supply  in 
their  African  colonies  that  would  make  them  in- 
dependent of  the  United  States.  We  have  spoken 
elsewhere  of  British  and  French  efforts  and  hopes, 
and  the  disappointments  experienced,  especially  in 
West  Africa.  British  initiative,  in  the  matter  of 
encouraging  cotton-growing  in  West  Africa,  was 
largely  private.  The  German  Colonial  Society, 
both  in  East  Africa  and  West  Africa,  took  up  the 
matter  of  cotton-growing  along  the  lines  of  the 
British  Cotton-Growing  Association.  If  success  in 
the  experimental  stages  was  greater  in  the  German 
than  the  British  colonies  in  West  Africa,  it  must  be 
confessed  that  this  success  was  largely  due  to  the 
greater  power  over  the  native  given  to  Europeans  by 
the  Germans  than  by  the  British.  In  British  West 
African  colonies,  a  European  is  fined  who  strikes  a 
native.  In  the  German  colonies,  one  can  flog  a 
native  up  to  twenty-five  lashes.  This  helps  greatly 
in  making  the  native  work.  But  the  method  is  in- 
compatible with  Anglo-Saxon  ideas  of  the  way  things 
should  be  done.  ^ 

'  It  must  not  be  forgotten  that  the  explanation  of  German  success 
in  road-building  and  in  enforcing  measures  for  health  and  cleanliness 
is  due  partly  to  compulsion  of  a  character  British  Government 
officials  (I  am  sorry  I  cannot  say  also  British  colonists)  would  not 
use. 

308 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


In  1907,  in  his  great  speech  before  the  Chambers  of 
Commerce,  Dr.  Dernberg  expressed  the  same  opinion 
and  the  same  prophecy  as  Mr.  Winston  Churchill,  that 
West  and  East  Africa  were  both  admirably  adapted 
to  growing  cotton  and  that  the  development  of  the 
industry  in  the  African  colonies  would  make  the 
mother  country  independent  of  the  United  States. 
In  German  East  Africa,  cotton  export  increased  from 
less  than  a  thousand  pounds  in  1902  to  half  a  million 
pounds  in  1908,  and  nearly  a  million  pounds  in  1913. 
Over  two  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  acres  were  laid 
out  and  in  the  process  of  development  for  cotton 
plantations  in  German  East  Africa  when  the  war 
broke  out.  Togoland  began  cotton  production  in  1 90 1 
with  twenty  thousand  pounds.  In  1908,  Togoland 
produced  about  a  million  pounds.  Not  much  has  yet 
been  done  with  cotton  in  Kamerun.  But  the  Ger- 
mans have  been  studying  possibilities  with  all  the 
keenness  and  energy  they  put  into  every  economic 
problem.  From  the  reports  of  Steubel,  Dernberg, 
Warberg,  and  Solf ,  one  gathers  that  Germany  had  high 
hopes  of  a  glorious  future  in  her  African  cotton  cultiva- 
tion. East  Africa  was  growing  Egyptian  cotton,  and 
the  price  of  land  compared  favorably  with  prices  in 
Egypt  and  in  Texas.  After  plow  cultivation  could  be 
introduced,'  the  probable  yield  of  the  African  colo- 
nies was  estimated  at  two  and  one-half  million  bales, 
which  would  satisfy  the  needs  of  German  industry. 

'Plowing  in  many  parts  of  Africa  will  not  be  practicable  until 
the  discovery  of  a  means  to  dastroy  the  tsetse  fly  or  to  protect  from 
his  bite  makes  possible  the  use  of  draft  animals.  The  tsetse  fly  is 
the  greatest  drawback  in  Africa  both  to  man  and  to  beast. 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


From  Duala,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Kamerun  River, 
a  railway  runs  north  behind  the  Kamerun  Mountains 
into  the  Manenguba  Mountains.  A  second  hne 
southeast  from  Duala  had  crossed  the  Sanaga  River 
and  was  being  constructed  along  the  valley  of  the 
Nyong  River,  when  the  war  broke  out.  A  railway 
into  the  hinterland  of  Kamerun  is  going  to  be  an  ex- 
tremely slow  and  costly  project.  But  it  is  bound  to 
pay  expenses,  and,  until  it  is  constructed,  the  hinter- 
land will  remain  largely  undeveloped  for  want  of 
means  of  transport.  Animals  cannot  be  used,  and 
porterage  is  too  expensive  except  for  rubber  and  ivory. 
In  the  fifteen  years  from  1899  to  1913,  imports  in- 
creased from  less  than  ten  million  marks  to  consider- 
ably over  thirty  million  marks,  and  exports  from  less 
than  five  million  marks  to  considerably  over  twenty 
million  marks.  The  railways,  as  far  as  they  were 
opened,  were  paying  well,  and  the  finances  of  the 
colony  were  on  a  very  sound  basis. 

Telegraphic  communication  in  Togoland  and 
Kameru,n  had  been  developed  in  recent  years  fully 
as  rapidly  as  anjrvvhere  in  Africa,  and  telephonic 
communication  more  rapidly.  The  natives  of  Togo- 
land  have  better  telephone  service,  and  avail  them- 
selves of  it  more  freely,  than  in  many  European 
countries.  In  1913,  Kamerun  was  connected  with 
Germany  by  direct  cable,  and  at  Kamina,  north  of 
Atakpame,  in  Togoland,  was  erected  in  the  same  year 
the  largest  wireless  station  in  Africa,  which  was  able 
to  communicate  directly  with  Germany. 

Aside  from  what  they  accomplished  in  the  matter 
of  sanitation  and  the  spread  of  the  knowledge  of 

310 


THE  GERMANS  IN  WEST  AFRICA 


preventive  medicine,  the  most  remarkable  achieve- 
ment of  the  Germans  in  West  Africa  was  their  school 
system.  Although  Kamerun  has  hardly  more  than 
half  the  area  of  its  neighbor,  Nigeria,  and  one-seventh 
of  the  population,  its  Government  and  assisted 
schools  in  191 3  were  proportionately  better  attended 
than  those  of  the  British  Protectorate.  Similarly, 
Togoland  has  better  school  opportunities  than  its 
French  and  British  neighbors.  In  1910,  Kamerun 
made  school  attendance  obligatory  for  children  of 
both  sexes.  There  was  plenty  of  zeal  and  peda- 
gogical ability,  and  a  very  earnest  desire  to  lift  the 
natives  to  a  higher  level,  morally  as  well  as  mate- 
rially. But  the  education  was  given  without  much 
affection  and  astonishingly  little  attention  was  paid 
to  native  psychology.  There  was  too  much  of  the 
idea  of  Germanizing  what  could  not  be  Germanized 
and  of  willing  that  the  natives  learn  rather  than 
of  winning  them  to  learn.  German  colonization 
shows  the  same  weaknesses  and  the  strong  points  of 
the  Teuton  that  have  been  revealed  to  the  world 
during  the  last  two  years  of  Herculean  struggle. 
Matchless  in  their  commercial  aptitude,  in  their 
industrial  resourcefulness,  in  their  scientific  genius, 
and  in  the  organization  of  their  administration,  the 
Germans  are  pitifully  weak  in  political  understanding, 
in  diplomacy,  and  in  ability  to  understand  and  handle 
other  nations. 


311 


CHAPTER  XVI 


THE  FRENCH  IN  WEST  AFRICA  AND  THE 
SAHARA 


HE  French  African  Empire  touches  the  Atlan- 


tic coast  at  six  places  from  the  Sahara  Desert 


to  the  Congo.  Gambia  and  Sierra  Leone, 
British  colonies,  the  republic  of  Liberia,  and  Portu- 
guese Guinea,  are  enclaves  of  French  territory  on  the 
Atlantic  coast.  The  British  Gold  Coast  and  Ger- 
man Togoland  are  surrounded  by  French  territory 
coming  down  to  the  Gulf  of  Guinea  on  either  side. 
The  French  Empire  also  completely  surrounds  the 
enormous  territory  of  British  Nigeria  and  German 
Kamerun,  reaching  the  Gulf  of  Guinea  on  the  north 
in  Dahomey  and  on  the  east  in  Gabun.  The  coast 
colonies  of  France  in  West  Africa  are  Senegal,  Guinea, 
Ivory  Coast,  Dahomey,  and  Gabun.  All  these  colo- 
nies have  the  same  general  characteristics,  and  are  con- 
fronted with  the  same  general  economic  and  climatic 
conditions  as  their  British  and  German  neighbors. 
But  they  have  the  advantage  of  being  connected 
with  each  other  by  contiguous  territory  and  with  a 
hinterland  that  goes  to  the  very  heart  of  Africa,  and 
extends  from  the  Congo  to  the  Mediterranean  without 
passing   through   foreign   territory.    The  import- 


312 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


ance  of  this  advantage  is  demonstrated  by  the 
fact  that  the  growth  and  prosperity  of  the  coast 
colonies  in  West  Africa  have  followed  the  French 
penetration  into  the  upper  valleys  of  the  Senegal 
and  Niger  and  Congo  and  the  spread  of  French  terri- 
tory in  the  Sahara  and  the  Sudan. 

French  West  Africa  was  almost  all  opened  up  and 
colonized  and  connected  during  the  last  decade  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  But  its  unity  and  official  status 
were  not  determined  until  the  decree  of  October  i, 
1902,  which  divided  French  West  Africa  as  follows: 
the  colonies  of  Senegal,  French  Guinea,  the  Ivory 
Coast,  Dahomey,  and  "the  territories  of  Senegambia 
and  the  Niger."  Gabun  on  the  west  side  of  the 
Gulf  of  Guinea  was  made  a  portion  of  French  Equa- 
torial Africa.  In  the  following  year  the  territory 
between  Senegal  colony  and  Spanish  Rio  de  Oro 
was  organized  as  the  Protectorate  of  Mauritania. 

Senegal  is  the  oldest  French  colony  in  West  Africa, 
and  goes  back  to  the  days  of  Richelieu.  Its  capital, 
St.  Louis,  was  settled  in  1637,  and  is  at  the  mouth 
of  the  Senegal  River.  But  the  most  important  city  of 
Senegal  is  the  modem  fortified  naval  station  of  Da- 
kar on  Cape  Verde,  the  western  point  of  the  African 
continent.  A  railway  connects  these  two  cities. 
There  is  river  navigation  from  St.  Louis  for  nearly 
five  hundred  miles  to  the  interior.  But  the  great 
railway  into  the  hinterland  of  West  Africa  joining 
the  Senegal  and  Niger,  to  Kayes,  the  former  capital 
of  the  region,  has  its  terminus  at  Dakar.  A  govern- 
ment cable  has  connected  Dakar  with  Brest  since 
^905,  and  there  are  other  coastal  cables,  and  cable 

313 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


connection  with  South  America.  French,  German, 
and  British  Hnes  make  Dakar  a  regular  port  of  call. 
Largely  because  it  is  the  route  of  through  trade  from 
all  the  vast  interior,  Senegal  has  more  than  half  the 
total  trade  of  the  French  West  African  colonies,  and 
reached  nearly  thirty  million  dollars  in  19 13. 

French  Guinea  lies  between  Portuguese  Guinea 
and  the  British  colony  of  Sierra  Leone.  Its  large 
port,  Konakry,  has  been  free  since  the  Anglo-French 
Agreement  of  1904,  when  the  Los  Islands,  which 
command  the  coast,  were  ceded  to  France.  If  this 
had  not  been  done,  Konakry  would  have  been  in  the 
tmfortunate  position  of  Swakopmund  in  German 
Southwest  Africa — at  the  mercy  of  the  British. 
This  is  one  illustration  of  the  many  advantages  that 
have  accrued  to  France  from  the  compounding  of 
colonial  rivalries  with  Great  Britain.  After  the 
Anglo-French  Agreement,  the  railway  was  pushed 
inland  rapidly,  and  reached  Kurussa  on  the  Niger 
River  in  191 1.  A  new  era  began  for  French  Guinea 
and  for  the  country  at  the  headwaters  of  the  Niger. 
It  was  an  important  step  forward  in  the  plan  of 
joining  the  Ivory  Coast  in  French  Guinea  by  an 
interior  railway. 

The  Ivory  Coast,  between  Liberia  and  the  British 
Gold  Coast,  has  a  larger  frontage  on  the  ocean  than 
either  of  its  neighbors,  and  the  great  advantage,  like 
all  the  French  West  African  colonies,  of  free  access 
to  the  great  Senegal-Niger  hinterland  under  the 
same  flag.  Lines  drawn  from  the  Ivory  Coast  and 
Dahomey  directly  north  to  Algeria  pass  all  the  way 
from  the  Atlantic  to  the  Mediterranean  through 

3H 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


French  territory,  won  and  consolidated  by  French  dar- 
ing and  persistence  in  two  generations.  The  most 
important  part  of  the  work,  however,  has  been 
accomplished  since  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth 
centtiry,  and  has  been  made  possible  by  railway 
extension  and  native  armies. 

The  French  became  acquainted  with  the  Ivory 
Coast  during  the  reign  of  Louis  Philippe,  while 
they  were  still  involved  in  the  conquest  of  Algeria. 
They  did  not  make  good  intangible  claims  until 
1883,  when  rumor  had  it  that  Germany  was  looking 
for  colonies.  The  Ivory  Coast  was  connected  with 
the  hinterland  in  just  the  opposite  way  to  that  of 
most  colonies.  The  penetration  was  from  the 
interior  to  the  coast.  After  the  fall  of  Timbuktu, 
when  many  officials  and  military  men  and  explorers 
were  occupied  with  the  problem  of  connecting  the 
upper  Niger  valley  with  the  Senegal  valley,  a  young 
marine  officer  conceived  the  plan  of  penetrating  also 
toward  the  Gulf  of  Guinea.  While  routes  were 
being  opened  up  from  the  Niger  to  Senegal  and  to 
Guinea,  he  would  open  up  a  route  to  the  Ivory 
Coast.  Between  the  Niger  and  the  Ivory  Coast 
lay  the  mountainous  Kong  region.  For  eighteen 
months,  with  one  French  companion.  Captain  Dinger 
was  lost  to  the  world.  He  finally  appeared  on  the 
Ivory  Coast,  having  blazed  a  route  for  France  with- 
out firing  a  shot.  Bingerville,  the  port  terminus 
of  the  railway  that  now  runs  into  the  heart  of  the 
Kong  country,  commemorates  one  of  the  most  re- 
markable and  most  useful  feats  in  the  history  of 
African  exploration. 

315 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  French  have  had  much  trouble  with  the 
natives  of  the  Ivory  Coast  during  recent  years,  and 
have  been  compelled  to  go  to  the  expense  of  a  num- 
ber of  punitive  expeditions.  Yellow  fever,  and  lack 
of  railways  and  roads,  as  well  as  the  mountain- 
ous character  of  the  Kong  region,  made  administra- 
tive work  very  difficult.  The  troubles  culminated 
in  the  rebellion  of  1909,  which  spread  among 
many  tribes.  Disarmament  had  to  be  undertaken 
on  a  large  scale.  To  their  amazement,  the  military 
authorities  were  able  to  gather  in  eleven  thousand 
rifles.  This  was  a  forcible  argument  for  the  advo- 
cates of  carrying  through  the  subjection  of  the  Sahara 
and  the  Sudan.  For  as  long  as  vast  regions  were  left 
to  tribes  who  did  not  acknowledge  French  authority, 
and  who  could  not  be  controlled,  gun-running  would 
continue;  and  local  authorities,  with  few  troops  at 
their  disposal  and  an  enormous  administrative  area, 
would  always  risk  a  serious  revolt  when  they  tried  to 
collect  taxes. 

The  Ivory  Coast-Kong  railway  serves  a  country 
rich  in  minerals  and  mahogany  forests,  and  has  ad- 
vanced far  enough  to  make  the  plan  of  joining  Senegal, 
French  Guinea,  and  the  Ivory  Coast  by  an  interior 
railway  system  a  reality  of  the  near  future.  Those 
who  scoffed  a  decade  ago  at  the  idea  of  Timbuktu 
being  connected  by  rapid  steamer  and  railway  service 
with  Dahomey,  the  Ivory  Coast,  Guinea,  and  Sene- 
gal, have  only  to  look  at  the  map  to  understand  that 
they  would  be  doubting  Thomases  if  they  refused 
still  to  believe  in  the  transformations  French  genius 
is  making  in  West  Africa.    Fifteen  years  ago,  it  took 

316 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


three  months  to  go  from  Dakar  to  Timbuktu.  One 
can  make  the  journey  now  in  ten  days.  Fifteen 
years  ago,  French  officials  took  a  month  for  traveHng 
from  the  Senegal  River  to  the  Niger  River.  Now 
they  need  two  days. 

Next  to  Senegal,  Dahomey,  the  narrow  little 
wedge  between  Togoland  and  Nigeria,  has  the  most 
distinctive  personality  of  the  West  African  colonies. 
The  Ivory  Coast  and  Guinea  owe  their  importance 
to  the  hinterland,  and  to  the  development  of  French 
influence  in  the  upper  Niger  valley.  Their  prosper- 
ity is  largely  dependent  upon  that  of  the  whole  of 
French  West  Africa.  Senegal  has  suffered,  from 
the  point  of  view  of  individuality,  since  it  became  a 
province  of  West  Africa.  This  is  illustrated  by  the 
way  Dakar,  administrative  center  for  the  group  of 
colonies,  has  eclipsed  St.  Louis,  the  old  capital  of 
Senegal.'    But  Dahomey,  farthest  removed  from 

'  "  Dakar,  in  1902,  was  only  a  simple  chance  landing  place,  without 
coal  and  without  water,  where  twice  a  month  the  Messageries  Mari- 
times  Company  threw  off  hastily  its  passengers  in  order  to  flee  as 
quickly  as  possible  towards  coasts  less  desert  and  climates  less 
unhealthy.  To-day,  Dakar,  protected  from  the  sea  by  a  powerful 
dyke,  receives  on  its  two  moles  three  or  four  steamers  a  day  (I  have 
seen  eleven  in  one  day)  which  find  in  abundance  coal,  drinking 
water,  fresh  vegetables.  The  city  is  growing  and  is  being  embel- 
lished. In  a  few  years  Dakar  will  be  one  of  those  cosmopolitan  ports 
like  Port  Said  or  Colombo,  where  people  are  elbowing  each  other  in 
the  streets,  and  where  the  largest  and  swiftest  vessels  of  the  world 
cross  each  other's  path.  And  yet,  the  plan  of  1902  appeared  rash 
even  to  those  who  wanted  to  believe  in  it.  The  Governor-General 
was  charged  with  megalomania,  and  here  after  a  decade  the  port 
is  too  small,  and  is  already  being  enlarged. " — M.  Guy,  former 
Governor  of  Senegal,  in  a  lecture  at  the  Ecole  dcs  Sciences  Poli- 
tiques,  April  16,  1913. 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  influences  that  have  brought  into  being  since 
1900  a  French  Empire  in  the  Senegal  and  Niger  val- 
leys, still  preserves  her  identity.  Dahomey  is  an 
historic  kingdom,  inhabited  by  a  race  very  dif- 
ferent from  those  of  the  hinterland  and  the  other 
French  colonies.  It  was  conquered  and  annexed  to 
France  in  somewhat  the  same  way  as  Madagascar 
during  the  last  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century, 
and  as  Ashanti  nearby  in  the  first  years  of  the 
twentieth  century. 

Like  its  neighbor,  Togoland,  Dahomey  has  a  very 
small  stretch  of  coast.  But,  unlike  Togoland,  its 
ports  are  not  at  the  mercy  of  other  powers.  There 
is  excellent  shelter  and  deep  water  at  Kotonu.  By 
her  possession  of  the  Grand  Popo,  France,  like  Great 
Britain,  holds  a  part  of  the  natural  coastline  of  Togo- 
land.  Railways  penetrate  inland  from  Kotonu 
nearly  two  hundred  miles,  and  from  the  capital, 
Porto  Novo,  fifty  miles  along  the  Lagos  frontier. 
There  are  less  than  seven  hundred  Europeans  in  the 
colony  in  the  midst  of  a  native  population  of  nine 
hundred  thousand.  In  the  hinterland,  between 
Dahomey  and  the  Niger,  is  Borgu,  which  the  British 
hoped  to  include  in  Nigeria,  when  their  Protectorate 
was  extended  by  Sir  Frederick  Lugard  over  the 
Sokoto  Empire. 

In  Algeria  and  Tunis,  and  in  most  of  the  West  and 
Central  African  territories,  France  has  been  able — 

Dakar  now  has  twenty-five  thousand  inhabitants,  of  whom  over 
three  thousand  are  French.  Its  poHce  force  numbers  ten.  St. 
Louis  has  about  the  same  population,  but  only  one-third  as  many 
French. 

318 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


sometimes  in  defiance  of  treaty  rights — to  destroy,  by 
gradual  measures,  the  principle  of  the  open  door 
which  Great  Britain  and  Germany  follow,  and 
which  has  been  forced  upon  Belgium.  The  open 
door  means  fair  play  and  equal  advantages  for  all. 
Neither  in  tariffs  nor  in  concession  regulations  are 
advantages  granted  to  the  subjects  of  the  nation 
holding  the  colony  which  are  not  granted  to  subjects 
of  other  nations.  Only  by  maintaining  the  open 
door  is  Great  Britain  able  to  justify  the  holding  of 
one-fourth  of  the  world's  productive  territories. 
Only  by  maintaining — or  rather -estabHshing  fairly — 
the  principle  of  equal  advantages  to  all  comers  can 
France  hope  to  keep  and  develop  properly  her  vast 
African  empire.  If  she  attempts,  after  this  war,  to 
extend  to  the  West  African  colonies  the  iniquitous 
tariff  regime  that  has  been  put  into  practice  in 
Algeria,  Tunis,  and  Madagascar,  not  only  will  her  own 
real  interests  be  jeopardized,  but  she  will  have  to  face 
another  war  with  Germany  within  the  next  genera- 
tion. A  nation  may  hold,  and  justify  her  right  to 
hold,  colonies  to  the  exclusion  of  other  nations,  by 
the  exercise  of  superior  colonizing  ability.  But  it  is 
unthinkable  that  she  be  allowed  to  make  a  national 
preserve  of  colonics  in  this  period  of  world  markets, 
unless  she  has  the  force  to  continue  to  keep  others  out. 

Bound  by  strict  treaty  obHgations,  France  has 
been  unable  to  make  tariff  discriminations  in  the 
Ivory  Coast  and  Dahomey.  She  has  taken  upon 
herself  similar  obligations  in  regard  to  Morocco. 
The  result  has  not  been  favorable  to  French  com- 
merce.  Dahomey  illustrates  the  inferiority  of  French 

319 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  German  commercial  methods.  In  1913,  Germany 
had  forty  per  cent,  of  the  total  commerce  of  Daho- 
mey, against  France's  twenty-four  per  cent.  German 
ships  carried  sixty  per  cent,  of  the  exports.  German 
ships  embarked  and  disembarked  twice  as  much 
tonnage  as  French  ships.  Seventy-five  per  cent,  of 
the  palm  nut  output,  valued  at  two  million  dollars, 
was  bought  by  Germans,  and  most  of  it  sent  to 
Hamburg,  which  has  become  the  first  market  in  the 
world  for  this  product.  From  Dahomey  and  the 
Ivory  Coast  together,  Hamburg  bought  nearly  a 
million  dollars'  worth  of  other  forest  products.  From 
Senegal,  Hamburg  took  in  1913,  peanuts  valued 
at  one  and  one-quarter  million  dollars  against  French 
purchases  of  thirty  thousand  dollars.  Many  tons  of 
peanuts  from  French  West  Africa  were  transported 
to  Hamburg  on  German  bottoms,  and  reshipped  from 
Hamburg  to  France  on  other  German  bottoms,  and 
sold  to  French  buyers.  The  French  paid  Germany 
two  commissions  and  two  freight  hauls  on  products  of 
their  own  colonies! 

Last  spring,  when  I  was  in  the  Riviera,  I  read  in  a 
local  newspaper  the  following: 

"  It  is  necessary  to  call  attention  once  more  to  the 
method  and  perseverance  of  the  Germans  in  their 
effort  to  gain  the  commerce  of  our  colonies.  They 
have  not  stopped  with  creating  at  Hamburg  a  market 
for  palm  nuts  rivaling  that  of  Liverpool,  and  with 
getting  their  money's  worth  out  of  the  products  they 
brought  to  this  market.  Their  chemists  set  to  work, 
with  the  result  that,  aside  from  the  manufacture  of 
soap  and  candles,  their  industry  has  succeeded  in 
extracting  from  palm  nuts  different  vegetable  fats, 

320 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


appreciated  for  their  cheapness  in  certain  European 
regions,  and  which  have  a  large  market  in  America. 
More  than  this,  they  have  been  able  to  find  on  the 
spot  a  market  for  the  residue,  which  has  been  adopted 
by  stock  raisers  for  nourishing  cattle,  and  which 
unfortunately  is  not  yet  common  as  stock  food  in 
France  and  England.  This  way  of  getting  all  there 
is  in  a  product  permits  them  to  pay  the  highest 
prices,  and  naturally  it  is  towards  the  market  where 
prices  are  highest  that  producers  direct  by  preference 
their  expeditions. " ' 

I  expected  to  read  a  splendid  lesson,  drawn  by  the 
writer  from  the  wholesome  truth  he  was  putting 
before  his  fellow-countrymen.  But  instead  of  stating 
that  Frenchmen  must  study  German  methods  and 
try  to  emulate  them,  this  writer  proposed  as  a  remedy 
for  ruinous  German  competition  the  enactment  of  a 
law  forbidding  to  Germans  the  privilege  of  doing 
business  on  any  terms  whatever  with  French  colo- 
nies !  This  curious  mental  attitude — blindness,  may 
we  call  it  ? — is  alarmingly  prevalent  in  France  to-day. 
If  what  this  writer  says  be  true,  what  will  be  the 
result  of  the  "remedy"  he  proposes?  Producers 
will  be  cut  off  from  the  market  where  they  get  the 
best  prices.  They  will  be  compelled  to  do  business 
with  merchants  and  manufacturers  who  are  not  alive 
to  the  full  value  of  the  product  they  are  buying,  or 
who  do  not  know  how  or  care  to  get  the  full  value  out 
of  it.  So  they  will  not  and  cannot  pay  the  prices 
Hamburg  pays.  The  quotation  I  have  cited  proves 
that  German  competition  is  beneficial  to  the  producer 
in  the  French  colony.    Who  will  suffer  if  this  whole- 

■  Nice  Petit  Niiois,  Apnl  25,  1916. 
ai  321 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


some  competition  is  destroyed  by  an  arbitrary  law? 
The  whole  wwld  indirectly,  but  first  of  all,  the 
French  colony. 

Senegal  colony  has  four  self-governing  communes, 
and  the  five  thousand  French  citizens  return  a  deputy 
to  the  Paris  Parliament.  The  other  coast  colonies 
have  not  as  yet  reached  the  self-governing  stage. 
There  are  too  few  Europeans. 

The  British  and  German  cotton-growing  associ- 
ations have  not  been  alone  in  their  efforts  to  make 
West  Africa  a  new  source  of  the  world's  cotton  sup- 
ply. The  Association  Cotonniere  of  Paris  has  been 
spending  a  great  deal  of  money  in  West  Africa  for 
the  past  ten  years.  Cotton,  as  a  wild  plant,  grows 
everywhere.  The  natives  know  its  value,  and  make 
use  of  it  in  their  weaving.  But  all  attempts  to  culti- 
vate cotton  for  the  market  have  failed,  as  in  the 
German  and  British  colonies.  The  n'atives  find  easier 
money  in  peanuts  and  forest  produce.  Cotton- 
growing  is  hard  work,  and  requires  a  long  period  of 
waiting  to  gather  the  harvest,  and  the  willingness 
to  put  aside  seed  for  next  year.  Only  if  they  are 
under  the  close  and  strict  control  of  white  over- 
seers will  the  negroes  bother  with  cotton.  That 
control  cannot  be  exercised — hence  the  failure  of 
cotton. 

In  spite  of  their  hinterland,  and  the  advantages 
they  enjoy  from  administrative  and  territorial  union 
with  each  other,  the  coast  colonies  of  French  West 
Africa  are  not  at  all  satisfied.  The  enclaves  belong- 
ing to  other  Powers  arc  a  continual  source  of  irri- 
tation, and,  from  the  French  standpoint,  spoil  the 

3-22 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 

homogeneity  of  the  Empire.  French  Imperialists 
maintain  that  British  Gambia  is  altogether  an  anom- 
aly. In  the  Agreement  of  1904,  Great  Britain  ceded 
Yarbutenda  to  France,  together  with  the  landing 
wharves  on  the  river  Gambia,  and  promised  that  if 
at  any  future  time  there  was  no  longer  free  access  by 
water  from  Yarbutenda  to  the  ocean,  further  terri- 
tory would  be  yielded.  This  removed  the  serious 
economic  difficulty  of  Southern  Senegal  and  the 
Dentilia  hinterland  of  not  being  able  to  enjoy  the 
natural  advantage  of  water  transport  on  the  Gam- 
bia. When  the  country  is  fully  developed,  the  advan- 
tage gained  in  the  Agreement  of  1904  will  be  of  the 
most  substantial  character.  Within  two  years  of  the 
signing  of  the  Anglo-French  Agreement,  the  British 
Foreign  Office  was  approached  with  a  proposition  to 
exchange  Gambia  for  territories  in  the  New  Hebrides 
or  for  the  complete  renunciation  of  French  rights  in 
Saint-Pierre  and  Miquelon.  The  French  claimed 
that  the  British  would  never  be  able  to  make  any- 
thing out  of  the  possession  of  the  valley  of  the 
Gambia,  and  that  it  was  a  thorn  in  the  flesh  of  an 
ally  that  ought  to  be  withdrawn.  They  represented 
also  that  the  commerce  of  Gambia  was  entirely  in  the 
hands  of  French  houses.  Similar  overtiires  were 
made  by  France  to  Germany  in  1912  to  secure 
the  cession  of  Togoland  in  exchange  for  territorial 
and  political  advantages  elsewhere.  I  have  under- 
stood from  a  good  source  that  this  proposition  was 
first  made  to  Germany  after  the  Agadir  crisis,  and 
that  it  was  blocked  by  the  unwillingness  of  Great 
Britain  to  assent  to  the  compensations  France 

323 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


proposed  to  give  Germany.  The  ambition  of  France 
to  do  away  with  Liberia  ahogether,  and  to  buy 
Portuguese  Gmnea,  was  openly  voiced  the  year  before 
the  war  by  a  former  governor  of  the  Ivory  Coast, 
who  stands  high  in  French  colonial  councils.' 

Ivlauritania,  as  we  have  said  before,  was  made  a 
separate  territory  in  1903,  at  the  time  of  the  redistri- 
bution of  Senegal  territories  and  the  formation  of  the 
Senegal-Niger  colony.  In  1909,  when  the  decision 
to  pacify  the  whole  Sahara  had  been  made,  and  when 
plans  were  definitely  laid  for  seizing  Morocco, 
Mauritania  was  made  into  a  protectorate.  Its 
northern  boundaries  have  never  been  fixed,  and 
taxes  have  not  been  widely  collected  from  its  popu- 
lation of  nomad  Moors, 

Behind  the  four  coast  colonies  and  the  Mauritania 
Protectorate  lies  the  fifth  province  of  West  Africa, 
whose  history  belongs  almost  wholly  to  the  period 
after  the  decree  of  1902.  In  the  decree  constituting 
West  Africa,  the  great  hinterland  was  called  "the 
territories  of  Senegambia  and  of  the  Niger."  After 
the  restoration  of  the  Senegal  Protectorate  to  Senegal 
colony  and  the  creation  of  Mauritania,  the  upper 
valleys  of  the  Senegal  and  the  Niger  were  without 
definite  status.  It  was  felt  that  civil  administration 
should  take  the  place  of  military  administration 
wherever  possible,  especially  since  railway  and 
steamer  communication  had  been  established  with 
the  coast.  The  relation,  too,  of  the  hinterland  with 
the  coast  colonies,  and  with  the  Governor- General 
at  Dakar,  was  extremely  uncertain.    In  1904,  "the 

°  See  L'Afrique  du  Nord  (Paris,  1913),  pp.  I19-121. 

324 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 

colony  of  Upper  Senegal  and  of  the  Niger"  was 
constituted.  It  was  styled  colony  for  want  of  a 
better  word.  It  is  unique  among  the  colonies  of 
Africa  and  of  the  whole  world.  Its  boundaries  are 
formed  on  the  west  and  south  by  the  French  and 
other  European  West  African  colonies,  on  the  east 
by  a  line  from  Lake  Chad  to  the  Tuareg-Azkar 
country  on  the  southwestern  border  of  Tripoli, 
and  on  the  north  by  the  Algerian  sphere.  It  includes 
the  upper  valley  of  the  Senegal  River,  two-thirds 
of  the  valley  of  the  Niger,  and  a  large  bit  of  the 
Sahara  Desert.  In  a  territory  of  eight  hundred 
thousand  square  miles  there  are  six  million  natives 
and  hardly  more  than  a  thousand  Europeans.  The 
eastern  and  northern  portions  of  the  colony  are  still 
under  military  control,  but  the  river  valleys  are 
administered  civilly.  Timbuktu,  near  the  top  of 
the  great  bend  of  the  Niger,  is  very  nearly  in  the 
center  of  the  colony.  Just  north  of  the  bend  of  the 
Niger,  the  Sahara  begins  and  stretches  to  the  Al- 
gerian and  Moroccan  frontiers. 

The  tenth  degree  of  longitude,  from  the  Mediter- 
ranean to  the  Atlantic,  passes  from  Tunis  through 
Ghadamcs  and  Ghat,  the  westernmost  points  of 
Tripoli,  to  the  place  where  the  Gulf  of  Guinea  turns 
south  in  German  territory.  West  of  the  tenth 
parallel  is  the  big  bend  of  Africa.  Almost  all  of  this 
quarter  of  the  continent  is  now  in  French  possession. 
Spain  in  Morocco;  Portugal  in  Guinea;  England  in 
the  valley  of  the  Gambia,  Sierra  Leone,  and  the  Gold 
Coast;  Germany  in  Togoland;  and  the  negroes 
mismanaging  Liberia  under  American  protection ;  are 

325 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


flies  in  the  French  ointment.  But  the  great  dis- 
appointments of  France — "errors  of  vision,"  her 
Imperialists  say — are  the  British  in  Nigeria  and  the 
Germans  in  Kamemn,  stretching  inland  to  the 
shores  of  Lake  Chad,  and  disturbing  France's 
"heritage"  just  across  the  desert  from  the  Italian 
"intruders"  of  TripoH. 

The  Germans  in  Kamerun,  especially  since  the 
territorial  readjustments  of  191 2  have  disturbed 
the  continuity  of  French  territory  and  French 
influence  from  the  Mediterranean  to  the  Congo. 
The  French  are  hoping,  however,  to  remedy  this  by 
eliminating  Germany  in  the  Treaty  of  191 7. 
)  The  great  fault  of  France,  thirty  years  ago,  was  to 
allow  the  ubiquitous  English  to  install  themselves  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Niger,  and  then  later  to  take  in  a 
third  of  the  Niger  valley,  and  all  of  the  Benu6 
valley.  Not  only  this,  but  even  after  French  West 
Africa  had  been  administratively  organized,  the 
British  were  allowed  to  extend  their  Protectorate  over 
the  Hausa  States  and  through  Bomu  to  Lake  Chad. 
British  alertness  and  vigilance,  seconded  by  genera- 
tions of  experience  and  a  fleet  and  a  merchant 
marine,  have  enabled  Britain  to  keep  on  the  process 
inaugurated  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  ago  of 
gathering  in  the  choicest  tit-bits  for  colonies  every- 
where in  the  world.  West  Africa  follows  the  general 
rule.  In  1891,  when  British  authority  was  definitely 
established  in  the  lower  Niger  valley,  and  the  French 
were  expending  their  energies  against  savage  tribes  of 
Senegambia  and  the  upper  Niger  and  pacifying  desert 
wastes,  Lord  Salisbury  ironically  declared:  "To 

326 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


the  French  the  Sahara  and  the  northern  caravan 
routes,  the  Niger  where  the  cataracts  are,  the  sand 
and  the  bush  and  the  waterless  wastes;  to  the  Eng- 
lish Sokoto,  Bornu,  and  the  splendid  route  of  the 
navigable  Niger  and  the  fertile  Benue  valley." 
By  the  Agreement  of  1904,  the  English  allowed 
France  a  frontier  with  Northern  Nigeria  that  did 
not  quite  push  her  into  the  desert.  But  on  the 
whole.  Lord  Salisbury's  words  still  contain  the 
kernel  of  the  matter.  Britain  bars  France's  outlet 
by  the  Niger  to  the  sea.  The  French  have  reached 
Lake  Chad  at  the  price  of  herculean  efforts  and  con- 
stant sacrifice  of  human  life  and  treasure.  But  the 
sides  of  Lake  Chad,  from  which  there  is  exit  by  rich 
and  fertile  territories  to  the  sea,  are  in  British  and 
German  hands  (all  in  British  hands  now).  France 
holds  the  desert  sides  of  Lake  Chad,  from  which  the 
exit  to  the  sea  passes  through  the  Sahara  to  the 
north  and  to  the  west.  The  French  at  Lake  Chad, 
in  addition  to  their  desert  route,  are  several  times 
farther  to  the  sea  than  are  the  British.  The  Senegal, 
which  the  French  control,  is  a  very  small  stream 
compared  to  the  Niger,  which  the  British  control. 

The  errors  and  disappointments,  and  the  flies  in 
the  ointment,  do  not  make  West  Africa  any  the  less 
one  of  the  epic  colonizing  feats  of  history,  and  a  rich 
reward  for  the  devotion  and  sacrifice  of  those  who 
have  given  their  lives  to  make  West  Africa  French. 
In  a  brief  review  of  this  character,  there  is  not  the 
space  to  recount  the  exploits  of  many  others  who 
performed  feats  that  rivaled  that  of  Bingcr  in  travers- 
ing the  country  from  the  Niger  to  the  Ivory  Coast. 

327 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


There  was  the  exploration  of  the  upper  Senegal, 
the  crossing  from  the  Senegal  to  the  Niger,  the 
exploration  of  the  Niger,  the  opening  of  the  routes 
to  Lake  Chad  from  the  Niger  and  across  the  Sahara 
from  the  north,  and  the  opening  of  the  route  from 
Algeria  to  the  Niger  across  the  desert.  First  there 
were  the  explorers,  who  had  no  maps  and  no  more 
knowledge  of  where  they  were  coming  out  or  whether 
they  would  come  out  than  Columbus  had.  Then 
mihtary  expeditions  followed,  which  had  to  over- 
come by  far  the  greatest  difficulties  that  any  coloniz- 
ing power  in  Africa  has  encountered  in  the  way  of 
armed  resistance  and  of  transporting  supplies  and  of 
keeping  open  a  line  of  communication.  The  French 
accompUshed  the  bulk  of  their  work  of  conquest 
before  the  days  of  wireless  telegraphy,  and  when 
parliaments  opposed  even  the  smallest  grant  for 
African  colonization.  There  was  ■  no  glory,  no 
reward  in  what  they  did.  The  metropolitan  news- 
papers could  hardly  be  induced  to  mention  the 
battles  in  which  French  officers  lost  their  lives. 

From  the  standpoint  of  the  pocket-book,  France 
had  begun  to  reap  a  rich  harvest  from  the  work 
of  her  West  African  colonizers  several  years  before 
the  Great  War  interrupted  economic  progress  in 
Africa.  In  ten  years  the  receipts  of  the  general  bud- 
get had  more  than  doubled,  and  each  year  the  sur- 
plus was  increasing.  Trade  passed  from  twenty-six 
million  dollars  in  1905  to  fifty-six  million  dollars 
in  1913.  Nearly  three  thousand  kilometers  of  rail- 
ways, government  owned,  and  a  large  river  steam- 
ship service,  government  run,  were  bringing  in  a  net 

328 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


profit  of  over  a  million  dollars  a  year.  Plans  were 
made  to  double  the  railway  system,  and  to  borrow 
one  himdred  and  twenty  million  dollars  for  that 
purpose.  In  1902,  the  only  railway  in  French  West 
Africa  was  the  little  line  of  a  private  company, 
joining  Dakar  and  St.  Louis. 

West  Africa  has  meant  most  to  France,  though, 
as  a  training  school  for  army  officers  and  as  a  reser- 
voir of  splendid  faithful  troops.  The  last  two  years 
have  amply  justified  the  plea  that  has  so  long  been 
made  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies,  that  every  bit  of 
energy  and  money  put  into  Africa  would  come  back 
with  interest  when  the  day  of  France's  need  for  more 
men  arrived.  For  from  Africa  woiild  be  brought  the 
trained  soldiers  to  equaHze  France's  inferiority  in 
population  to  Germany.  As  an  American  and  an 
Anglo-Saxon,  I  cannot  overcome  my  personal  pre- 
judice against  the  idea  of  introducing  African  troops 
to  fight  white  men.  As  a  student  of  history,  I  have 
my  misgivings  about  the  ultimate  wisdom  of  the 
Anglo-French  poHcy  of  calling  upon  Africa  and 
Asia  to  help  fight  their  battle  in  Europe.  But  under 
the  circumstances  of  19 14,  when  France  found  her- 
self suddenly  the  victim  of  a  long  and  methodically 
planned  aggression,  what  Frenchman  in  his  right 
senses  would  have  opposed  calling  to  the  rescue 
every  possible  helper?  They  came  from  Senegal, 
from  Morocco,  from  Algeria,  from  Tunis,  from  the 
desert,  thousands  of  excellent  soldiers,  eager  to  fight 
for  France.  And  they  played  an  important  part 
during  two  years  up  to  the  moment  that  the  defense 
of  Verdun  proved  the  turning-point  of  the  war. 

329 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 

Equal  in  military  value  to  their  possibilities  as 
reservoirs  of  men  are  North  and  West  Africa  as 
training  grounds  for  officers.  Constant  African 
fighting  since  1900  has  given  to  officers  of  the  French 
army  a  more  valuable  experience  in  actual  warfare 
than  that  enjoyed  by  the  officers  of  other  European 
Powers.  Great  Britain  had  officers  with  fighting 
experience — but  they  were  few  in  number.  The 
Germans  had  the  training  and  the  discipline,  but  it 
was  of  the  schools.  When  the  armies  came  into 
conflict  in  1914,  the  practical  advantage  was  wholly 
with  France. 

The  Anglo-French  Agreement  of  1904  and  the  set- 
tling definitely  of  the  limits  and  status  of  the  French 
West  African  colonies  made  possible  for  the  first 
time  maps  that  were  not  guesswork.  Frontiers 
were  delimited  with  Great  Britain  in  the  Gold  Coast 
and  in  Nigeria,  and  with  Germany  around  Lake  Chad 
and  in  Togoland.  In  1907,  an  Anglo-French  treaty 
fixed,  in  accordance  with  the  spirit  of  the  'Agree- 
ment of  1904,  the  important  border  from  the  Niger 
to  Lake  Chad.  Within  a  year  this  frontier  was 
completely  furnished  with  stone  pyramids  and  other 
permanent  marks  for  a  distance  of  a  thousand  miles. 
The  Sudan  and  Lake  Chad  frontiers  with  Kamerun 
and  the  Togoland  boundary  were  finally  settled  by 
the  Franco-German  Commission  that  sat  at  Berne 
in  the  summer  of  19 12  to  arrange  the  Morocco 
"compensations. " 

When  the  French  went  to  Algiers,  a  line  was 
drawn  some  few  miles  back  from  the  coast  beyond 
which  it  was  believed  they  would  never  pass.  The 

330 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


conquest  of  the  Kabyles  marked  another  "extreme 
limit."  But  in  time  expeditions  got  all  the  way  to 
the  desert.  That  was  certainly  the  end!  The 
French  penetrated  the  Niger  valley  by  way  of  the 
Atlantic  and  the  Senegal.  They  were  south  and 
north  of  the  Sahara.  In  order  to  open  a  route  to 
Central  Africa,  the  West  African  penetration  was 
carried  beyond  Lake  Chad  into  the  Sudan.  In  order 
to  make  secure  the  hinterland  of  Algeria  and  Tunis, 
and  prevent  slave-trade,  gun-running,  and  the  pan- 
Islamic  propaganda.  North  African  penetration  was 
carried  to  the  border  of  Tripoli  into  the  Tuareg 
country.  The  Tuaregs  inhabited  both  sides  of  the 
desert,  and  the  oases  of  the  desert.  They  were  as 
numerous  south  of  Timbuktu  as  they  were  south  of 
Ghat,  and  they  barred  the  way  from  the  Niger  to 
Lake  Chad. 

In  1900,  French  officers,  who  had  taken  part  in 
desert  expeditions  and  who  were  interested  in  the 
development  of  West  Africa  and  the  Sudan,  began 
to  declare  that  the  Sahara  must  be  pacified,  and 
that  all  the  caravan  routes  must  be  in  the  hands  of 
the  French.  They  were  treated  as  madmen  or  fools. 
Ten  years  later  what  they  advised  was  not  only 
attempted,  but  was  pretty  well  on  the  way  of  reali- 
zation. A  French  Minister  of  War  once  had  plans 
drawn  up,  and  filed  in  the  Rue  Saint-Dominique 
for  a  Sudan  expedition  from  Algeria.  He  counted  on 
a  force  of  forty  thousand  men — owing  to  the  neces- 
sity of  conquering  the  Tuaregs.  Eventually  they 
were  conquered  by  a  few  hundred  natives  on  camels 
under  the  command  of  a  few  dozen  Frenchmen. 

331 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Establishing  order  in  the  Sahara  became  possible — 
and  easy — when  European  and  even  Algerian 
methods  were  given  up,  and  nomad  tribes  were 
organized  militarily.  By  the  Meharistes  the  French 
have  succeeded  in  policing  the  Sahara,  and  making 
safe  the  caravan  routes.  The  French  flag  now  flies 
on  every  important  oasis.  In  1906,  military  patrols 
of  West  Africa  and  Algeria  met  in  the  Sahara.  They 
have  been  meeting  ever  since.  Rarely  do  they  have 
to  use  their  arms.  The  best  way  to  get  to  Timbuktu 
and  Lake  Chad  is  still  by  Senegal.  But  crossing 
from  Algeria  is  not  impossible. 

The  military  problem  in  West  Africa  has  been 
solved.  The  problem  ol  commimications  is  well  on 
the  way  to  solution.  Miraculous  economic  develop- 
ment depends  wholly  upon  the  solution  of  the  labor 
problem.  West  Africa  is  a  white  man's  country  nei- 
ther on  the  coast  nor  in  the  hinterland.  Agricultural 
settlers,  to  take  up  and  work  the  land,  as  in  Algeria 
and  Tunis,  cannot  be  expected.  Travel  facilities, 
medicines,  and  knowledge  of  how  to  dress  and  what 
to  eat  and  the  precautions  to  take  against  fevers, 
have  made  it  possible  for  white  men  to  live  and  move 
about  in  the  coimtry.  But  aside  from  traders  and 
officials,  and  managers  of  plantations,  no  Europeans 
live  in  West  Africa.  Given  the  security  of  an 
organized  government,  the  direction  of  sldlled  men, 
the  establishment  of  banks  and  commercial  firms, 
and,  above  all,  means  of  transportation,  the  natives 
of  West  Africa  will  have  to  work  out  themselves  the 
destinies  of  West  Africa.  If  the  country  is  to  go 
ahead,  and  develop  wealth,  the  natives  will  have  to 

332 


FRENCH  AFRICAN  EMPIRE 


do  the  work.  The  labor  problem,  then,  as  every- 
where in  Africa,  is  the  chief  preoccupation  of  officials 
and  students  of  these  French  colonies.^ 

Nowhere  is  the  population  as  large  as  it  ought  to 
be.  Nowhere  do  the  natives  show  much  disposition 
to  work.  Negroes  have  no  sense  about  caring  for 
their  own  health  or  the  health  of  their  children,  and 
no  thought  of  putting  aside  to-day  something  for 
to-morrow's  needs.  Plagues  and  epidemics  spread 
very  rapidly  among  them.  They  make  no  attempt 
to  check  illness  in  their  families  and  in  their  com- 
munities. When  they  have  a  good  year,  and  make 
money,  they  stop  work  until  they  have  spent  their 
surplus.  As  inseparable  to  the  negro  as  his  skin 
is  the  notion  that  one  works  only  when  he  hc.s  to. 
Since  West  Africa  is  not  a  white  man's  country,  the 
hope  of  the  future  lies  wholly  in  the  Europeaniza- 
tion  of  the  natives.  Physicians  and  dispensaries, 
teachers  and  schools  are  what  West  Africa  must 
have.  Economic  prosperity  is  an  idea  of  ours  and  a 
goal  of  ours.    Civilization  is  what  we  have  created, 

'  Slave-trade  has  practically  disappeared.  But  house  slavery,  as 
in  all  European  colonics  where  Islam  is  the  religion,  continues  to 
exist,  and  is  exceedingly  difficult  to  cope  with.  In  a  circular  of  Dec. 
4,  1905,  M.  Roume,  Governor-General  of  West  Africa,  said:  "The 
coming  of  native  populations  into  a  state  of  more  advanced  civili- 
zation is  not  accomplished  by  decrees.  It  will  result  only  from  a 
series  of  patient  and  convergent  efforts,  having  for  purpose  the 
moral  and  material  betterment  of  the  native  by  assuring  to  each  one 
his  rights,  especially  the  most  sacred  of  all,  the  liberty  of  the  individ- 
ual."  But,  until  the  individual  knows  and  feels  that  liberty  is  a 
right  and  his  right,  what  can  decrees  accomplish?  The  abolition  of 
slavery,  like  every  other  reform  in  the  world,  is  a  matter  of  enlighten- 
ment through  education  rather  than  of  law. 

333 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


and  what  we  think  is  a  thing  to  have.  In  parts  of 
Africa  where  the  white  man  can  live,  he  can  estab- 
lish his  ideas  and  his  goal  and  his  civilization  by 
dispossessing  the  native  of  the  land,  and  taking  it  for 
himself.  In  other  parts  of  Africa,  when  we  attempt 
to  introduce  our  civilization  we  demoralize  the 
native,  both  from  the  physical  and  social  point  of 
view,  unless  we  can  somehow  get  him  to  see  things  as 
we  do  and  understand  and  appreciate  the  new  environ- 
ment as  we  understand  and  appreciate  it.  Unless 
physician  and  teacher  inculcate  into  him  our  ideas 
of  health  and  wealth  he  will  have  neither.  Nor  will 
the  Eiu-opeans  who  live  with  him. 


334 


CHAPTER  XVII 


FRENCH  PENETRATION  INTO  CENTRAL 


AKE  CHAD  is  south  of  the  Sahara  Desert, 


directly  opposite  the  southernmost  angle  of 


Tripoli,  on  the  hne  of  latitude  that  passes 
through  Sicily  and  Naples.  British  Nigeria  and 
German  Kamerun  form  its  south  and  east  shores. 
The  rest  of  the  lake  is  bordered  by  what  the  French 
ImperiaHsts  dreamed  it  would  all  be — French  terri- 
tory. Lake  Chad  stands  about  halfway  across  the 
African  continent.  Directly  to  the  west  the  French 
colony  of  Senegal,  with  its  great  modem  port  of 
Dakar,  lies  on  the  Atlantic  coast.  Between  Senegal 
and  Lake  Chad  all  is  French  territory.  Directly  to 
the  east,  at  the  depth  of  the  Gulf  of  Aden,  and  hold- 
ing the  African  shore  of  the  Strait  of  Bab-el-AIandeb, 
lies  French  Somaliland,  with  its  port  of  Djibouti. 
During  the  last  half  of  the  nineteenth  century  Lake 
Chad  was  to  mark  the  middle  point  of  a  trans- 
continental railway,  just  as  real  to  French  Imperial- 
ists as  was  the  Cape  to  Cairo  Railway  to  British 
Imperialists. 

But  while  the  French  were  expending  their  ener- 
gies in  the  bsirren  wastes  of  North  Central  Africa,  the 


AFRICA 


335 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


British  were  occupied  with  reaHties.  In  South 
Africa,  they  were  planning  to  absorb  the  Dutch 
republics.  In  North  Africa,  the  reconquest  of  the 
Sudan  by  Lord  Kitchener  and  his  combined  British 
and  Egyptian  army  came  just  in  time  to  frustrate  the 
plans  and  hopes  of  France.  The  French  had  reached 
Fashoda  on  the  Nile,  almost  to  the  Abyssinian  border. 
They  had  actually  planted  their  flag  there.  The 
British  told  them  to  take  the  flag  down.  It  was 
either  obey  or  go  to  war.  They  could  not  go  to 
war:  so  they  obeyed.  The  final  argument  in  African 
colonization  has  always  been  force.  There  were 
many  coups  in  African  colonial  poHtics  before  Agadir. 
The  British,  of  course,  argued  that  the  whole  valley 
of  the  Nile  was  Egyptian  territory,  abandoned  only 
temporarily  to  the  Mahdi,  and  that  the  French  had 
no  right  there.  But  had  the  tables  been  reversed, 
the  British  certainly  would  never  have  hauled 
down  the  flag.  Possession  is  nine  points  of  the  law — 
no,  ten — if  you  have  force  on  your  side,  and  only  if 
you  have  force  on  your  side. 

After  the  humiliation  of  Fashoda,  France  made  an 
agreement  about  the  Sudan,  in  which  Tibesti,  Borku, 
Wadai,  and  the  Chad  territory  south  to  the  Niger  were 
recognized  as  hers  by  Great  Britain  in  return  for 
leaving  the  British  in  undisputed  possession  of  the 
desert  of  Libya,  at  the  eastern  end  of  the  Sahara, 
and  of  the  whole  valley  of  the  Nile,  and  acknowledg- 
ing British  rights  over  Darfur. 

The  Sudan  Convention  of  1899  was  a  very  reason- 
able arrangement.  If  one  grants  the  intention  of  the 
British  to  remain  permanently  in  Egypt,  and  the  ad- 

336 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


visability  of  their  doing  so,  both  for  their  own  interest 
and  for  the  interest  of  the  Egyptians,  the  possession  of 
the  Egyptian  Sudan  was  certainly  essential  to  assure 
the  future  political  security  and  economic  prosperity 
of  Egypt,  and  the  action  of  Kitchener  in  compelHng 
the  French  withdrawal  from  Fashoda  was  just  and 
wise  and  logical.  But  at  that  time  the  French 
denied  the  British  right  to  stay  in  Egypt.  In  fact, 
they  had  Great  Britain's  word  that  she  intended  to 
withdraw  from  Egypt.  Hence  the  British  claim  to 
the  upper  Valley  of  the  Nile,  based  on  Egyptian  rights 
that  had  practically  been  abandoned,  was  to  the 
French  bad  faith  and  brutal  bluff.  But  the  British 
were  going  to  stay  in  Egypt,  and  the  French  had 
their  hands  full  pacifying  and  organizing  the  already 
tremendous  territories  in  Africa  to  which  they  laid 
claim.  By  the  Convention  of  1899,  France  had  a 
right  to  expect  British  diplomatic  support  against 
Italy  and  Turkey  in  the  north,  and  against  Ger- 
many who  was  making  great  strides  in  the  hinter- 
land of  Kamerim.  The  Sudan  Convention  was  the 
precursor  of  the  general  agreement  of  five  years  later, 
which  made  possible  the  Entente  Cordiale.  French, 
as  well  as  British  ImperiaUsts,  then,  cannot  in 
retrospect  deplore  the  Fashoda  crisis  and  the  conse- 
quent clearing  of  the  atmosphere  between  the  two 
greatest  African  colonizing  powers. 

French  West  Africa,  as  we  have  seen,  was  formed 
into  a  distinct  administrative  area  in  1902,  and  the 
military  area  of  its  hinterland  colony  extended  as 
far  cast  as  Lake  Chad.  It  was  not  until  1906,  after 
the  Anglo-French  agreement  of  1904  had  been  worked 
"  337 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


out  in  detail,  that  the  French  were  able  to  bring 
together  their  Sudan  and  Congo  spheres  of  influence. 
By  decree  of  February  15,  1906,  French  Congo  was 
formed,  with  four  provinces:  the  Gabun  colony, 
the  Mid  lie  Congo  colony,  the  Ubangi-Shari-Chad 
colony,  and  the  Chad  military  region.  In  1910, 
French  Congo  became  French  Equatorial  Africa. 

Gabun  is  a  coast  colony  on  the  Atlantic,  just  south 
of  the  Gulf  of  Guinea  and  taking  in  the  bend  of  which 
Cape  Lopez  is  the  western  point.  Its  northern 
frontier  is  the  very  narrow  strip  of  Kamerun  that 
separates  French  territory  from  Spanish  Guinea 
(Rio  Muni).  The  Gabun  River,  really  a  deep  bay, 
from  which  the  colony  takes  its  name,  is  in  the  extreme 
north.  At  its  mouth  is  Libreville, '  the  capital.  The 
principal  river,  which  runs  for  several  hundred  miles 
through  the  heart  of  the  colony,  and  empties  into 
Nazareth  Bay,  to  the  north  of  Cape  Lopez,  is  the 
Ogowe.  Here  Port  Lopez  has  been  established. 
On  the  coast  at  the  south,  French  territory  is 
separated  from  Belgian  Congo  for  a  short  distance 
by  a  little  Portuguese  enclave  around  Kabinda 
Bay. 

Gabun,  like  other  west  coast  colonies,  is  a  heritage 
to  France  from  the  days  of  Louis  Philippe.  Libre- 

'  Libreville,  as  its  name  indicates,  was,  like  Freetown  in  Sierra 
Leone,  originally  a  settlement  of  emancipated  slaves.  When  the 
intercontinental  slave  trade  of  Africa  was  destroyed  in  the  middle  of 
the  nineteenth  century,  the  principal  part  in  this  great  work  was 
played  by  the  British  and  French  fleets.  It  is  natural  that  the 
influence  of  the  two  Occidental  Powers  along  the  Atlantic  coast  of 
Africa,  exercised  altruistically  in  this  humanitarian  movement, 
shoidd  have  resulted  in  precious  political  and  territorial  advantages. 

338 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


ville  was  foiinded  in  the  year  after  the  fall  of  the 
Orleans  dynasty,  and  Cape  Lopez  was  acqmred 
diiring  the  Second  Empire.  The  interior  of  the 
Gabun  was  made  known  to  the  children  of  my  gener- 
ation in  English-speaking  countries  by  the  books 
and  lecttires  of  Paul  du  Chaillu.  The  hinterland  of 
Gabim  and  the  territory  of  the  Middle  Congo  Colony 
were  won  by  explorers  in  the  late  seventies  and  early 
eighties. 

Inland,  the  Middle  Congo  colony  occupies  the 
north  bank  of  the  Congo  for  some  hundreds  of  miles. 
Its  capital,  Brazzaville,  which  is  directly  opposite 
Leopoldville  in  Belgian  Congo,  is  named  for  the 
intrepid  French  explorer  who  reached  the  Congo 
at  this  point  thirty-five  years  ago,  and  prevented 
Stanley  from  occupying  both  banks  of  the  river. 
Since  the  Agadir  crisis  was  compounded  with  Ger- 
many, two  spurs  of  territory  reaching  the  Congo  at 
Gonga  and  Mongumba,  together  with  a  substantial 
bit  of  hinterland,  were  ceded  by  France  to  Germany 
on  September  28,  1912.  These  two  projections  of  the 
Kamertm  spoil  the  continuity  of  French  territory 
from  the  Sudan  to  the  Atlantic. 

The  third  colony,  Ubangi-Shari-Chad,  comprises 
the  regions  north  of  the  Belgian  Congo,  east  of 
Kamervm  and  west  of  the  Bahr-el-Ghazal  province 
of  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan.  Darfur  is  north 
of  the  eastern  portion  of  the  colony.  The  Ubangi 
River  forms  the  larger  portion  of  the  boundary  with 
Belgium.  At  the  beginning  of  the  sharp  bend  in 
this  river,  which  is  the  most  important  northern 
tributary  of  the  Congo,  has  been  established  the 

339 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


capital,  Bangtd.  In  the  colony  are  the  headwaters 
of  the  River  Shari,  which  flows  into  Lake  Chad. 

The  fourth  province  of  French  Equatorial  Africa 
is  known  as  the  Chad  Military  Territory.  It  forms 
the  connection  by  land  with  the  other  portions  of 
France's  African  empire,  and  has  been  won  since 
the  Sudan  Convention  of  1899.  Kanem,  northeast 
of  Lake  Chad,  was  conquered  in  1903.  Immediately 
afterwards,  most  of  the  sultans  of  Wadai  accepted 
the  French  Protectorate.  Wadai  is  the  southern 
and  largest  of  the  three  provinces  of  the  Sudan  the 
British  consented  in  the  Convention  to  regard  as 
French.  It  lies  between  Lake  Chad  and  Darfur. 
The  other  two  provinces,  Borku  and  Tibesti,  are 
between  the  Sahara  and  the  Libyan  deserts,  on  the 
western  border  of  Egypt,  and  southeast  of  Tripoli, 
Since  the  definite  French  occupation  of  Abeshr,  the 
principal  city  of  Wadai,  in  19 10,  the  French  have 
sent  many  expeditions  into  Borku  and  Tibesti,  as  a 
part  of  the  general  plan  of  pacifying  and  keeping 
patrolled  the  Sahara  Desert.  We  have  spoken  else- 
where of  the  Turkish  activity  in  the  last  years  of 
Abdul  Hamid  and  the  first  two  years  of  the  Young 
Turk  regime,  which  brought  the  Ttuks  and  the 
French  into  conflict  in  the  oases  between  Tripoli 
and  Lake  Chad.'  France  established  her  rights  in 
the  hinterland  of  Tripoli  just  in  time  to  confront 
Italy  with  a  fait  accompli.  The  Italian  attempt 
to  conquer  Tripoli  drew  from  the  desert  the  most 
warlike  of  the  tribesmen,  and  turned  the  attention  of 
the  Senussi  towards  a  new  foe.    Since  the  Italians 

'  See  above,  p.  121. 

340 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


went  to  Tripoli,  the  Senussi  have  directed  their 
principal  efforts  against  them. 

France,  while  freed  of  pressure  in  the  Lake  Chad 
region,  had  not  yet  been  able  to  call  Borku  and 
Tibesti  more  than  a  "sphere  of  influence"  when  the 
European  War  broke  out.  In  the  Wadai  also,  the 
French  were  not  altogether  masters  of  the  situation. 
The  Governor-General  of  Equatorial  Africa  com- 
plained that  he  had  less  than  five  thousand  men  for 
policing  a  coimtry  four  times  as  large  as  France, 
while  his  colleague  of  West  Africa  could  count  on 
more  than  ten  thousand  troops.  Events  in  Morocco 
led  to  the  diminishing  of  military  effort  in  1913. 
Sultan  Ali  of  Darfur  never  accepted  the  Anglo- 
French  Convention  of  1899.  He  paid  a  nominal 
tribute  to  the  British  as  long  as  Khartum  let  him 
alone.  Against  the  French,  he  was  continually 
plotting.  Ali  helped  the  Senussi  in  their  attack 
against  Egypt  in  191 5,  and  in  the  spring  of  191 6 
he  came  out  boldly  for  the  Turks  and  Germans, 
declaring  that  he  must  obey  the  KhaHf's  injunction 
to  enter  "the  Holy  War."  The  French  garrisons  in 
Wadai  had  been  depleted  to  conquer  and  hold  Kam- 
erun.  Serious  trouble  for  the  French  was  averted 
only  by  the  prompt  action  of  Sir  Reginald  Wingatc, 
Governor- General  of  the  Anglo-Egyptian  Sudan, 
who  sent  an  expedition  into  Darfur  to  occupy 
El-Fashr  in  May,  1916. 

In  1 90 1,  a  commercial  convention  was  made 
between  France  and  the  Congo  Free  State.  France 
was  dependent,  for  the  outlet  of  her  trade,  upon  the 
Belgian  Railway,  and  has  remained  so  throughout 

341 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  period  of  our  survey.  Direct  French  communi- 
cation to  the  coast  will  not  be  possible  until  the 
railway  from  Brazzaville  on  the  Congo  to  Loango,  on 
the  Atlantic,  is  completed. 

In  the  development  of  her  Congo  territories, 
France  has  had  to  face  the  same  conditions,  and 
has  made  the  same  mistakes,  as  the  Belgians  in  Cen- 
tral Africa.  Although  it  is  not  pleasant  to  do  so, 
it  is  necessary  to  deal  here  rather  fully  with  problems 
and  abuses :  for  a  review  of  European  colonization  in 
Africa  in  the  twentieth  century  would  not  be  com- 
plete without  touching  upon  weaknesses  that  have 
arisen  in  French  administration.  It  is  only  fair  to 
say,  however,  that  the  criticism  can  be  directed 
against  European  colonization  in  general  in  Central 
Africa.  French  maladministration  is  merely  the 
specific  illustration.  The  sources  of  information, 
except  in  the  question  of  the  effect  of  the  concession- 
naire  system  upon  the  open  door  principle  in  trade, 
are  wholly  French,  and  of  unimpeachable  authority.^ 
:  At  the  time  the  convention  with  Belgium  was 
made,  British  firms  claimed  that  they  were  being 
excluded  from  the  possibility  of  developing  their 
trade  in  the  French  Congo  in  exactly  the  same  way  as 
in  the  Belgian  Congo.  The  whole  country  was  being 
farmed  out  to  French  concessionnaires  in  violation 

'See  E.  D.  Morel's  British  Case  against  the  French  Congo,  and 
Fdicien  Challaye's  Le  Congo  Frangais  (Alcan,  Paris,  1909).  M. 
Challaye  was  a  member  of  the  mission  sent  by  the  French  Govern- 
ment in  1905,  under  M.  dc  Brazza,  to  investigate  conditions  in  the 
French  Congo.  His  volume  is  invaluable  eye-witness  testimony, 
and  is  written  carefully  and  judicially.  I  have  borrowed  constantly 
from  it  in  this  chapter. 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


of  the  Berlin  Act.  When  representations  were 
made  to  France,  as  the  result  of  complaints  from 
British  subjects  to  the  Foreign  Office,  Paris  an- 
swered to  London  that  the  Berlin  Act  had  become, 
in  respect  to  monopolies  at  least,  a  dead  letter. 
Arbitration,  however,  was  agreed  upon.  But  the 
concessionnaire  system  had  become  so  deeply  rooted 
that  it  was  found  difficult  to  remedy  its  abuses,  both 
from  the  standpoint  of  foreign  traders  and  of  native 
victims,  without  a  radical  administrative  reorganiza- 
tion. Funds  as  well  as  the  intelligent  and  independ- 
ent personnel  for  accomplishing  this  were  lacking. 

In  1904,  an  official  investigating  commission, 
under  de  Brazza,  the  famous  explorer,  who  had 
opened  up  the  Congo  to  France  back  in  Stanley's 
time,  started  from  Libreville,  and  made  an  extensive 
tour  of  the  three  French  colonies.  What  they  found 
was  so  disheartening  that  M.  de  Brazza  declared 
that  he  would  never  have  explored  this  country, 
and  brought  it  imder  European  control,  had  he 
realized  what  suffering  and  disaster  European  pene- 
tration was  going  to  bring  to  the  natives.  Worn  out 
by  fever  and  broken-hearted,  M.  de  Brazza  died 
before  his  mission  was  completed. 

At  Libreville,  after  fifty  years,  there  was  not 
even  a  wharf,  and  the  total  European  population 
amounted  to  sixty  men  and  five  women .  The  original 
inhabitants  of  the  coast  country,  from  whom  the 
colony  took  its  name,  were  rapidly  dying  out,  killed 
by  the  vices  introduced  by  Europeans.  The  natives 
of  the  Gabun  hinterland  declared  that  the  conces- 
sions companies,  who  had  them  at  their  mercy, 

343 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


were  constantly  putting  up  the  price  of  the  objects 
they  sold  them.  The  companies  demanded  always 
rubber,  rubber,  and  more  rubber.  Trade  was  in  kind, 
and  the  natives  had  no  appeal  from  the  arbitrary 
exactions  of  their  taskmasters.  Since  taxes  were 
not  being  used  for  the  development  of  the  country, 
but  to  enrich  the  companies  and  compel  the  natives 
to  work  for  the  concessionnaires,  taxes  were  regarded 
as  fines.  To  escape  the  taxes,  the  inhabitants  of 
Gabun  abandoned  the  edges  of  the  river  and  hid 
their  villages  in  the  jungle.  A  decree  of  the  Governor 
in  1904  forbade  immigration  to  Kamerun,  where 
the  natives  liked  to  go,  because  they  were  paid 
there  for  their  labor. 

At  Loango,  prosperity  had  been  killed  by  the  loss 
of  through  trade,  which  went  to  Belgium  after  the 
Free  State  Railway  was  built.  The  Loangos  had 
the  attitude  of  the  Gabunese  towards  taxation. 
They  would  be  willing  to  pay  taxes,  they  declared,  if 
only  the  money  were  used  to  give  them  roads  and 
bridges  and  especially  schools.  But  they  paid,  when 
they  were  compelled  to,  and  got  nothing  in  return. 
They  were  not  allowed  to  leave  the  cotmtry.  The 
concessionnaires  recruited  labor  at  Loango  by  force. 
The  laborers  were  called  "volunteers,"  and  were 
given  "contracts."  When  the  de  Brazza  mission 
interrogated  them,  it  was  discovered  that  they  had 
been  taken  inland  "without  knowing  where  they  were 
going  or  what  work  they  were  going  to  undertake. 
They  believed  they  were  engaged  for  a  year.  They 
ask  us  with  anxiety  how  many  moons  they  must 
still  remain  here.    The  work  is  too  hard  and  the 

344 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


food  insufficient ;  many  of  them  are  of  heartsickening 
thinness.  Their  contract  and  pay  books,  which, 
according  to  the  law,  should  be  in  their  possession, 
are  in  the  hands  of  their  white  foreman.  What  good 
would  it  do  if  they  did  have  them?  They  do  not 
know  how  to  read.  Most  of  these  books,  which 
ought  to  be  vised  by  a  government  official,  have  no 
signature.  AU  contain  this  stipulation:  'The  con- 
tract wiU  be  cancelled,  with  no  indemnity  for  cancel- 
lation, when,  for  whatever  motive,  the  laborer 
renders  no  more  services  to  the  company.'  Warning 
to  those  who  are  accidentally  injured  or  who  fall  ill!" 

At  Bangui,  the  commission  found  that  the  fore- 
man of  the  companies  exercised  pressure  upon  the 
blacks  to  bring  in  rubber  by  seizing  their  women 
and  children,  and  holding  them  as  hostages  until 
the  allotted  quota  was  brought  to  the  company's 
compound.  In  1904,  at  Bangui,  one  concessions 
company,  which  made  a  practice  of  this  barbarous 
hostage  system,  shut  up  in  a  small  hut  sixty-eight 
women  and  children,  without  air  and  food  and 
water  enough  to  keep  them  alive.  The  crime  hap- 
pened to  be  discovered  by  a  young  French  physi- 
cian. He  demanded  their  release.  Forty-five  women 
and  two  children  were  found  dead.  Only  thirteen 
women  and  eight  children  were  still  alive.  Some 
of  them  died  in  spite  of  all  the  exertions  of  their 
liberator.  The  case  could  not  have  been  unique. 
It  was  discovered  only  because  it  happened  on  the 
path  of  travelers.  The  Government  of  the  French 
Congo  failed  to  take  action  because  "proof  was 
lacking,"  and  the  official  who  ordered  the  imprison- 

345 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ment  of  these  hostages  was  soon  after  promoted  from 
Bangui  to  Brazzaville.  This  is  a  statement  of  fact, 
substantiated  on  the  ground  by  personal  investi- 
gation. It  happened  only  twelve  years  ago,  and  is 
a  crime,  of  the  twentieth  century. 

In  the  High  Shari,  which  is  conceded  to  a  company, 
at  the  end  of  1904,  the  chief  of  the  Bibigri  tribe  was 
arrested  on  the  ridiculous  charge  of  obstructing  "the 
liberty  of  commerce, "  because  he  would  not  or  could 
not  make  his  people  bring  in  the  amount  of  rubber 
arbitrarily  imposed  upon  his  tribe  by  the  concession- 
naires.  A  month  later  he  died  in  prison.  To  avenge 
his  death,  the  Bibigris  revolted,  and  killed  nearly 
thirty  of  the  black  foremen,  employees  of  the  com- 
pany, who  were  oppressing  them.  The  troops  who 
went  to  put  down  the  revolt  found  in  the  houses  of  the 
natives  the  skulls  of  the  foremen,  filled  with  balls 
of  rubber.  "It  was  a  striking  symbol,"  wrote  the 
scribe  of  the  de  Brazza  mission,  "well  expressing  the 
real  cause  of  these  cruel  and  awful  revolts, " 

It  was  at  Dakar,  on  his  way  back  to  France,  that 
M.  de  Brazza  died.  His  friend  and  companion 
wrote : 

"The  book  one  ought  to  re-read  in  the  French 
Congo  is  the  Injerno  of  Dante.  All  my  life,  I  shall 
preserve  the  sadness  of  having  seen,  with  my  own 
eyes,  a  real  hell.  M.  de  Brazza  saw  a  despotic  ad- 
ministration, eager  to  establish  badly  calculated  or 
vexatious  taxes,  to  demand  their  payment  by  brutal 
procedures,  to  frighten  natives,  and  to  drive  them 
from  European  control  instead  of  bringing  them  under 
our  administration  by  protecting  them.    He  saw  the 

346 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


concessions  companies,  rapacious  and  cynical,  trying 
to  reconstitute  anew  slavery,  to  impose  upon  the 
blacks,  by  threat  and  violence,  insufficiently  remuner- 
ated work,  instead  of  trying  to  attract  them  by  free 
and  loyal  commerce.  He  saw  how  officials,  by  fre- 
quent brutahties,  had  fallen  to  the  level  of  the  most 
barbarous  negroes.  He  knew  in  all  its  details  the 
odious  history  of  the  High  Shari:  forced  porterage, 
camps  of  hostages,  razzias,  and  massacres.  From 
these  terrible  discoveries,  M.  de  Brazza  suffered  in 
his  heart.  This  heroic  sorrow,  this  subhme  sadness, 
spent  his  strength  and  hastened  his  end.  He  said 
in  dying:  'The  French  Congo  must  not  become  a  new 
Belgian  Motigala.'  " 

In  1905,  at  Brazzaville,  occurred  the  trial  of  two 
French  officials  of  the  High  Shari  for  "voluntary 
homicide."  There  were  several  serious  charges 
against  them  of  murder  of  natives  in  their  jurisdiction. 
It  had  taken  two  years  to  bring  them  to  justice,  and 
this  was  the  first  time  white  men  had  been  prosecuted 
in  a  serious  way  before  a  French  civil  court.  Mes- 
siexirs  Toque  and  Gaud  were  brought  to  trial  for 
crimes  committed  at  Fort  Crampel  in  1903.  There 
had  been  many  rumors  in  connection  with  many 
officials.  But  evidence  was  hard  to  get.  Probably 
nothing  would  have  been  done  in  this  case,  had  it 
not  been  for  the  energy  and  insistence  of  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  Gouraud,  commandant  of  the  Mihtary  Terri- 
tory of  Chad,  who  was  determined  to  put  a  stop  to 
the  evil  reputation  France  was  getting  among  the 
natives  of  his  jurisdiction  because  of  the  crimes  of 
regularly  commissioned  colonial  officials  in  Shari, 
where,  according  to  one  of  the  accused.  Toque, 

347 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


every  consideration  of  humanity  had  to  be  subordi- 
nated to  the  necessity  of  getting  porters  to  carry 
rubber.  "It  was  a  general  massacre  we  had  to 
institute  in  order  to  make  the  service  run,"  said 
Toque.  •  Against  Toque,  the  charges  were :  shooting 
a  Moruba  porter,  who  refused  to  carry  burdens; 
ordering  killed  with  a  bayonet  a  native  chief ;  drown- 
ing a  porter  who  stole  cartridges  by  having  him 
thrown  into  the  Nana  Falls.  Gaud  was  accused  of: 
throwing  a  woman  into  the  River  Gribingui ;  beating 
men  and  boys;  boiling  a  negro  chief's  head,  and 
compelHng  his  servant  to  drink  the  water  after- 
wards; and  other  crimes  of  a  revolting  nature. 
Together  the  two  men  were  accused  of  various 
unbelievable  tortures,  causing  the  death  of  several 
natives,  and  of  tying  a  dynamite  cartridge  to  a 
man's  head,  and  blowing  his  head  off. 

All  the  crimes  were  not  proved.  The.  court  went 
on  the  principle  laid  down  by  Dr.  Cureau,  in  a  study 
on  the  psychology  of  negro  races:  "The  testimony  of 
the  negro  in  justice  offers  absolutely  no  guarantee. 
But  from  the  confessions  of  the  accused  and  from 
testimony  of  white  witnesses,  the  two  cases  of  throw- 
ing a  man  into  the  Nana  Falls  and  of  blowing  off 
another  man's  head  with  a  stick  of  dynamite  were 
proved.  Toque  and  Gaud  were  condemned  each  to 
five  years  imprisonment. 

The  condemnation  provoked  a  great  deal  of 
astonishment  and  indignation  among  the  Europeans 
of  Brazzaville.  The  friends  and  associates  of  the  con- 
demned refused  not  only  to  shake  hands  with  the 

« See  Revue  generale  des  sciences,  July,  1904. 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


judges  but  with  those  who  ate  with  them.  For 
the  first  time  since  they  had  been  in  the  Congo,  the 
Frenchmen  and  other  Europeans  who  had  sloughed 
off  decency  and  civilization  were  reminded  of  the 
existence  of  law  and  order  and  justice.  It  had 
never  occurred  to  them  that  a  negro  had  rights. 
One  French  functionary  drew  distinction  between 
homicide  and  animalicide.  In  his  opinion,  Toque 
and  Gaud  were  merely  guilty  of  animalicide.  An- 
other young  official,  when  the  sentence  was  pro- 
nounced, cried  out:  "Are  we  to  become  naturalized 
negroes?"  The  military  officials,  however,  who  had 
come  from  the  Chad  district  with  the  determination 
to  see  that  justice  was  done,  were  highly  satisfied 
with  the  verdict,  and  expressed  in  no  uncertain  terms 
their  contempt  of  Frenchmen  who  could  fall  so  low 
as  to  sympathize  with  and  take  the  part  of  these  de- 
generates. But  Toque  and  Gaud  had  been  defended 
in  court  by  the  civil  governor  of  Brazzaville ! 

For  two  years  after  the  de  Brazza  investigation, 
there  was  ample  confirmation  of  the  reports  of  those 
who  accompanied  the  great  explorer  on  his  last 
African  trip  in  serious  and  widespread  native  up- 
risings. Some  tribes  arose  en  masse.  Senegalese 
troops  had  to  be  used  in  large  numbers. to  "pacify" 
those  who  had  been  goaded  to  the  breaking  point 
by  torture  and  abuse  of  concessionnaires  and  their 
brutes  of  henchmen.  An  expedition,  which  started 
from  Brazzaville  to  find  a  direct  trade  route  in  the 
unknown  region  between  Lake  Chad  and  the  Congo 
basin,  in  order  that  the  trade  which  was  passing 
through  Kamerun  might  be  directed  to  French 

349 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


posts,  learned  how  terrible  was  native  hatred  and 
how  difficultly  bridged  the  chasm  of  native  mistrust 
of  the  French. 

Fortvmately,  the  revelations  of  the  de  Brazza 
mission  were  not  without  wholesome  effect  in  Paris. 
The  French  Congo  has  not  become  a  new  Belgian 
Mongala,  although  it  was  rapidly  drifting  that  way. 
Much  has  been  accomplished  that  was  needed  in  the 
way  of  reform  by  the  establishment  of  a  common 
central  administration  in  1910.'  But  the  evils  of 
the  old  regime  were  not  eradicated  root  and  branch. 
Although  greatly  mitigated,  they  still  remain.  They 
always  will  remain  in  the  French  Congo  until  an 
abundant  official  class,  recruited  from  the  upper 
classes,  is  found  to  administer  the  country  in  the 
interest  of  the  natives,  instead  of  in  the  interest  of 
their  exploiters. 

The  blame  that  attaches  to  France  and  to  her 
Colonial  Ministry  is  in  allowing  the  French  flag  to 
wave,  and  in  assuming  the  responsibility  of  govern- 
ment, over  regions  where  concessions  companies 

'  New  arrangements  were  made  in  1910  with  the  chief  concession- 
naires.  They  were  on  the  basis  of  cultivation  or  other  actual  use 
of  the  land.  The  companies  were  permitted  to  select  their  blocks 
of  land,  with  definite  limits.  The  title  would  revert  to  them  in 
1920,  only  if  during  ten  years  there  was  systematic  exploitation 
and  development  by  the  concessionnaires  themselves.  All  rubber 
concessions  were  to  revert  to  the  state  in  1920,  and  after  that  time 
leases  would  be  renewed  yearly,  subject  to  the  production  and  conduct 
of  the  companies.  Rights  were  recognized  of  natives  to  their 
own  villages  and  to  their  local  customs,  and  to  all  the  produce  of 
their  own  lands.  They  might  also  collect  forest  produce  from 
undeveloped  lands.  Contracts  between  chiefs  and  companies  for 
tribal  labor  were  subject  to  the  approval  of  the  Governor-General. 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


are  given  uncontrolled  power  to  exploit  the  blacks 
for  their  own  benefit;  and  then  in  sending  troops 
to  punish  the  natives  for  doing  what  Frenchmen 
would  do  under  similar  circumstances,  protecting 
their  wives  and  children  from  dishonor,  torture,  and 
death.  What  a  mockery  to  free  the  negroes  of  Cen- 
tral Africa  from  the  slave  trader,  and  then  turn  them 
over  to  soulless  corporations  with  a  thousand  times 
more  power  to  bully  and  drive  and  massacre  than 
Tippoo  Tib  and  his  ilk!  There  is  blame,  also,  for 
putting  power  in  the  hands  of  Senegalese  brutes, 
and  invariably  supporting  them  in  the  exercise  of 
that  power.  Most  of  all,  there  is  blame  in  allowing 
France  and  Christian  civiHzation  to  be  represented 
by  officials  who  would  hardly  find  a  place  in  the 
mother  country  outside  of  a  jail.  In  the  Congo 
region,  what  one  could  say  to  Portugal  and  Belgium 
during  the  first  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century,  one 
could  say  to  France:  If  you  are  not  prepared  to  as- 
sume the  government  of  this  country,  in  accordance 
with  the  standards  of  justice  you  insist  upon  in  France, 
you  ought  not  to  have  undertaken  the  government. 

Washing  dirty  linen  is  a  painful  and  unpleasant 
business.  It  is  an  unprofitable  business,  also,  unless 
it  serves  some  good  purpose.  I  would  not  feel  justi- 
fied in  speaking  of  the  sad  maladministration  in  the 
French  Central  African  colonies,  if  I  were  not  able  at 
the  same  time  to  suggest  the  reasons  for  this  malad- 
ministration, and  the  way  in  which  it  can  be  remedied. 

Central  Africa  has  an  evil  effect  upon  the  moral 
sense  of  the  white  man,  when  left  too  much  alone  or 
entrusted  with  the  exercise  of  uncontrolled  power. 

351 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


He  becomes  lazy,  careless,  neurasthenic,  credulous. 
In  continual  contact  with  the  brutality  of  the  blacks, 
and  their  hopeless  degradation,  out  of  touch  with  the 
civilization  whose  magic  is  in  the  ability  it  gives  man 
to  dominate  his  natural  bestial  instincts  by  a  culti- 
vated spiritual  control,  the  Eiuropean  quickly  de- 
generates. He  becomes  as  careless  of  human  life  as 
those  around  him.  He  commits  acts  of  cruelty  with- 
out a  qualm,  the  remembrance  of  which  haunts  him 
continually  years  later  when  he  returns  to  civili- 
zation. Only  men  of  the  strongest  character  and 
moral  fiber,  who  have  been  born  and  raised  in  an 
atmosphere  of  culture,  who  have  gone  through  the 
severe  discipline  of  cultural  education,  who  have 
inherited  the  habit  of  exercising  authority,  and  who, 
when  they  return  from  their  post,  go  by  right  of  blood 
and  ability  into  cultivated  circles  and  to  responsible 
positions,  are  fit  to  be  entrusted  with  administrative 
posts  in  Central  Africa.  For  this  type  of  man  alone 
is  able  to  resist  the  demoralizing  influences  of  solitude, 
degrading  surroundings,  and  unUmited  power  of  the 
Central  Africa  official. 

The  British  send  this  type  of  man  to  Africa. 
Other  nations  do  not.''    Hence  the  joy  of  natives 

'  In  his  Guide  Pratique  de  I'Europeen  dans  I'Afrique  Occidenlale, 
Dr.  Barot  writes:  "For  those  who  have  not  the  necessary  moral  force 
to  endure  two  years  of  absolute  continence,  there  is  only  one  practi- 
cable line  of  conduct,  temporary  union  with  a  well-chosen  native 
woman."  The  advantages  of  such  a  step  are  glowingly  set  forth. 
Dr.  Barot  declares  that  no  wrong  is  done  to  the  temporary  little 
wife,  for  native  morality  is  not  at  all  severe.  "The  former  wives  of 
Europeans  are  very  much  sought  after  by  the  blacks  and  generally 
marry  very  well. "    See  pp.  328,  330. 


FRANCE  IN  CENTRAL  AFRICA 


under  the  British  flag,  and  the  misery  of  natives  under 
other  flags. 

Let  it  be  remembered  that  I  am  not  speaking  of 
commissioned  army  officers.  I  am  speaking  of  ad- 
ministrative officials  in  the  civil  service.  The  very 
best  men  of  France,  gentlemen  in  the  fullest  conno- 
tation of  the  word,  have  served  in  the  French  African 
army.  One  may  ask  why  the  French  army  is  able 
to  draw  the  best  while  French  colonial  civil  service 
recruits  from  a  class  not  in  any  way  representative  of 
the  best  in  French  life.  The  answer  is  not  hard  to 
give. 

As  I  look  from  my  study  window,  I  see  four  splen- 
did boys  playing  in  the  sand.  They  are  helping 
my  children  build  a  trench  to  let  in  the  water  when 
the  tide  comes  up.  In  their  faces,  in  their  bearing, 
in  their  actions,  they  tell  the  story  that  only  blood 
tells.  Their  father  died  just  two  years  ago  in  the 
battle  of  the  Mame.  His  widow  said  to  me 
the  other  day,  "My  husband  was  bom  to  fight  the 
Germans,  and  he  spent  his  Hfe  in  learning  how  to  do 
it. "  It  is  not  the  glamour  of  colonial  service  or  the 
desire  to  build  up  a  new  world  that  has  sent  the  best 
of  France  into  Africa  in  the  army.  They  went  there 
to  learn  how  to  fight  the  Germans,  and  to  train  sol- 
diers to  fill  the  gaps  in  the  French  army  caused  by 
depopulation.  They  looked  upon  Africa  as  a  school 
in  warfare  and  a  reservoir  of  warriors  against  the 
inevitable  day. 

The  Frenchman  of  the  upper-classes,  when  it  is 
not  a  question  of  national  defense,  has  no  desire  to  go 
abroad  and  no  reason  for  doing  so.  The  upper-class 
^3  353 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Englishman  is  pushed  into  the  exile  of  colonial  civil 
service  by  reasons  of  caste  and  by  the  law  of  entail. 
The  money  in  the  family  goes  to  the  eldest  son, 
and  the  others,  not  wanting  to  engage  in  trade,  enter 
government  service.  French  law  reqiaires  that  a 
man's  money  be  divided  equally  among  his  children. 
Then  there  is  the  family.  English  fathers  and  moth- 
ers bring  their  children  up  with  the  idea  that  they  are 
going  to  leave  them  and  work  out  their  own  salva- 
tion. French  fathers  and  mothers  bring  up  their 
children  with  the  idea  that  they  are  going  to  keep 
them  with  them  or  near  them  as  long  as  they  live. 
To  the  Englishman  of  the  upper  classes,  England  is  a 
country  to  be  mildly  proud  of  but  not  to  live  in  until 
one  is  over  fifty,  and  even  then  not  all  the  time.  To 
the  Frenchman,  France  is  a  country  never  to  be  left 
except  under  dire  necessity.  To  the  Englishman, 
London  is  a  city  to  visit  occasionally  between  pro- 
tracted week  ends,  but  never  to  live-in  if  you  want  to 
make  a  reputation  for  yourself.  To  the  Frenchman, 
reputation  is  made  only  in  Paris. 

A  very  keen  French  critic  once  told  Jules  Ferry 
that  Indo-China  and  Madagascar  and  the  Congo 
would  never  be  distinctively  French,  and  would 
never  bring  glory  or  profit  to  France.  "Why?" 
asked  the  Colonial  Prophet.  "Too  far  from  Paris," 
was  the  laconic  reply. 


354 


CHAPTER  XVIII 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO  BEFORE 
ALGECIRAS 

r  I  ^HE  portion  of  Africa  nearest  Europe  and 


America,  and  adjoining  the  most  highly  de- 


*  veloped  European  colony  in  Africa,  was,  at 
the  opening  of  the  twentieth  century,  the  most  back- 
ward, the  most  unknown,  the  most  inaccessible. 
Morocco,  on  account  of  the  rivalry  of  the  Powers, 
remained  outside  European  "spheres  of  influence" 
until  Great  Britain  and  France  compounded  colonial 
differences  in  the  famous  Agreement  of  1904.  In  the 
decade  from  1904  to  1914,  Morocco  was  "taken  over" 
by  France,  but  not  until  after  Europe  had  been  led 
from  one  international  crisis  through  another  to  the 
catastrophe  of  a  world  war.  Commercial  antago- 
nism, irreconciliable  political  aims,  and  traditional 
hatreds  could  have  brought  the  Great  Powers  to  a 
twentieth  century  war  without  Morocco.  But  with- 
out Morocco,  war  might  have  been  deferred  and  the 
alignment  of  the  Powers  might  have  been  different. 
The  student  of  history  may  not  be  able  to  find  in  his 
studies  positive  assurance  of  the  avoidability  of  war. 
But  he  certainly  finds,  even  in  contemporary  history, 
positive  assurance  of  the  impossibility  of  predicting, 


355 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


from  decade  to  decade,  which  nations  are  to  be 
aUies  and  which  are  to  be  enemies.^  Of  this  truth, 
Morocco  is  the  present-day  illustration. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century,  British 
and  Germans  were  working  together  against  France 
in  Morocco.  The  British  were  more  vigorous  than 
the  Germans  in  their  opposition  to  the  desire  of 
France  to  repeat  what  she  had  done  in  Tunis  by 
getting  possession  of  the  other  "key  to  her  house. 
The  British  contention,  frequently  put  into  print, 
was  that  the  independence  of  the  Shereefian  Empire 
must  be  upheld  at  all  costs.    Britain  was  the  pro- 

'  The  Crown  Prince  of  Japan  received  a  tremendous  ovation  in 
Petrograd  during  the  last  week  of  September,  1916.  Ten  years  ago 
he  would  have  been  lynched.  Turkish  troops  are  fighting  with 
Bulgarians  against  Servians  in  Macedonia.  Three  years  ago, 
Bulgarians  and  Servians  were  fighting  against  Turks.  Italy  and 
Rumania  are  in  the  field  against  their  allies  of  yesterday.  A  Greek 
anny  corps  recently  sought  protection  of  the  Bulgarians  against 
France  and  England  at  Cavalla.  The  SheriflE  of  Mecca  is  fighting 
the  Khalif  of  the  Moslem  world.  The  most  popular  contemporary 
Breton  song  contains  averse  in  which  England  is  treated  as  the  enemy 
of  France  at  sea.  The  British  army  now  occupies  Normandy,  with 
bases  at  Rouen  and  Havre,  as  a  friendly  army  come  to  defend  France. 
Not  many  years  ago  Guy  de  Maupassant  put  the  following  words 
into  the  mouth  of  a  physician  at  Gisors  in  one  of  his  most  famous 
stories:  "In  spite  of  my  hatred  against  the  German  and  my  desire 
for  vengeance,  I  do  not  detest  him,  I  do  not  hate  him  by  instinct 
as  I  hate  the  Englishman,  the  real  enemy,  the  hereditary  enemy,  the 
natural  enemy  of  the  Norman.  For  the  Englishman  has  passed 
over  this  soil  inhabited  by  my  ancestors,  has  pillaged  it  and  ravaged 
it  twenty  times,  and  my  aversion  for  this  perfidious  race  has  been 
transmitted  to  me,  with  my  life,  from  my  father. "  See  Le  Rosier 
de  Mme.  Husson,  in  the  collection  En  Famille  (Ollendorf,  Paris), 
p.  83. 

'  Speech  of  Jules  Ferry  on  Tunisian  policy  in  Chamber  of  Depu- 
ties, November  5,  188 1. 

356 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


tector  of  weak  nations  against  the  strong.  What 
Emperor  William  said  at  Tangier  in  1905,  and  what 
the  German  press  wrote  at  the  time  of  Algeciras  and 
Agadir,  is  substantially  what  has  been  said  in  more 
than  one  Speech  from  the  Throne  of  Queen  Victoria 
and  what  the  British  press  wrote  before  the  bargain 
with  France.  When  one  reads  what  was  going  on  in 
Morocco  fifteen  years  ago,  the  pages  consecrated  by 
English  writers  of  the  present  time  to  German  in- 
trigues inAfrica  are  amusing  and  amazing  reading.  In 
their  indignation  against  Germany  and  in  the  accusa- 
tion that  Germany  has  tried  to  "block  the  legitimate 
aspirations  of  other  nations, "  as  one  eminent  author- 
ity puts  it,  they  indict,  by  the  same  token,  their  own 
policy  in  more  than  one  part  of  Africa,  as  well  as  the 
policy  of  France,  now  their  ally  but  fifteen  years  ago 
their  bitter  enemy. 

As  will  be  seen  in  this  chapter  and  the  chapters  that 
follow  it,  I  have  deep  sympathy  and  warm  admira- 
tion for  French  policy  in  Morocco  and  British  policy 
in  Egypt.  These  two  countries  are  far  better  off 
under  British  and  French  rule  than  they  would  be  if 
Britain  and  France  had  stayed  out.  But  I  have  no 
patience  with  insincerity  in  recording  historical 
events  and  with  the  cant  that  sees  only  right  in 
what  one  does  oneself  or  what  one's  friend  does,  and 
only  wrong  when  the  identical  thing  is  done  by  an 
enemy.  We  shall  have  a  lasting  peace  on  the  day  we 
recognize  that  human  nature  is  the  same  the  world 
over  (and  in  particular  diplomatic  nature).  If 
things  have  been  done  differently,  and  have  brought 
different  results,  it  is  because  special  influences  have 

357 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


been  at  work  in  one  case,  or  with  one  nation,  that 
were  lacking  in  another  case  and  with  another  nation. 

During  the  five  years  preceding  the  Agreement  of 
1904,  France,  thwarted  at  Fashoda  and  converted  to 
the  necessity  of  a  constructive  and  logical  African 
program,  began  her  effort  to  secure  the  Moroccan 
"key  to  her  house. "  The  most  effective  opposition 
to  her  attempts  to  gain  control  of  the  Moorish  army, 
to  obtain  harbor  and  mining  concessions,  and  to 
secure  a  "rectification"  of  the  Algerian  frontier,  was 
that  of  the  British  Legation.  The  German  Legation 
was  a  very  poor  second.  Britain  and  Germany, 
though  their  dual  and  common  influence  was  suffi- 
cient to  ruin  the  French  program,  were  not  able  to 
obtain  advantages  for  themselves.  Much  as  she 
welcomed  Germany's  aid  against  France,  Britain 
did  not  want  a  naval  rival  anywhere  on  the  African 
coast  opposite  Gibraltar.  Germany  thought  Egypt 
and  Malta  and  Cyprus  and  Gibraltar  were  enough 
for  Britain  in  the  Mediterranean.  France  had  a 
sincere  desire,  and  a  very  good  reason,  to  see  peace 
and  order  and  economic  prosperity  brought  to  Mo- 
rocco. The  Anglo-German  policy  paralyzed  every 
effort,  both  of  Moroccan  and  French  authorities,  to 
improve  political  and  economic  conditions  in  the 
northwestern  corner  of  Africa.  British  policy  in 
Morocco  before  1904  is  similar  to  that  in  Persia  and 
Turkey,  the  two  other  independent  Moslem  states. 
Reforms  that  might  bring  political  and  economic 
strength  were  opposed  on  purely  selfish  grounds,  and 
with  no  thought  or  care  for  the  interests  of  the  nations 
used  as  pawns  in  the  diplomatic  game.    This  fact  is 

358 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


irrefutable.  Before  April  8,  1904,  the  British  Min- 
ister, advising  the  Sultan  of  Morocco  as  a  friend 
whose  interest  he  had  at  heart,  urged  him  to  resist 
French  advances  and  combat  French  influences. 
After  April  8,  1904,  he  told  the  Sultan  that  he  must 
do  what  the  French  said.  The  British  Minister  at 
Teheran  did  exactly  the  same  thing  with  the  Persians 
in  regard  to  Russia  before  and  after  the  Agreement 
of  1907. 

The  present  dynasty  of  Morocco  was  founded  in 
1660  by  Reshid,  a  descendant  of  the  Prophet,  who 
began  his  career  at  Talifet,  in  the  south  near  the 
desert;  subjected  the  tribes  of  Udja  and  Riff;  and 
finally  established  his  capital  at  Fez.  His  recogni- 
tion ii^  the  region  of  Udja  marked  the  final  disappear- 
ance of  Ottoman  authority  in  Morocco.  Reshid 
never  became  sovereign  of  the  whole  of  Morocco :  nor 
did  his  successors.  One  cannot  understand  recent 
events  in  Morocco,  unless  he  keeps  constantly  in 
mind  the  nature  of  sovereignty  in  the  Shereefian 
Empire.  There  are  three  differences  between  the 
Moroccan  conception  of  the  state  and  ours : 

1.  The  Sultan's  authority  depends  upon  his 
recognition  by  other  religious  chiefs,  who  are,  like 
himself,  descendants  of  the  Prophet.  There  is  a 
traditional  right  of  blood  but  not  of  primogeniture. 

2.  The  state  is  not  a  geographical  conception. 
The  Sultan  rules  over  tribes,  not  over  territories. 

3.  By  no  means  all  the  tribes  recognize  the 
authority  of  the  Sultan.  Some  never  have  recog- 
nized his  authority.  Morocco  is  divided  into  two 
distinct  sections:  the  Makh"-en  and  the  Siba.  The 

359 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Makhzen  are  the  tribes  who  recognize  the  authority 
of  the  Sultan,  and  the  Siba  are  those  who  do  not. 
The  Makhzen  and  the  Siba  are  all  mixed  up  in  differ- 
ent parts  of  the  country. 

These  three  facts  show  how  absurd  was  the  Anglo- 
German  contention  that  Morocco  must  not  "lose 
her  independence,"  and  the  French  contention  that 
the  Sultan  was  responsible  for  the  actions  of  all  the 
tribes  within  the  region  our  maps  call  Morocco. 
Before  the  British  sold  out  the  Shereefian  Empire  to 
France,  the  Sultan  could  always  play  one  power  off 
against  another,  and  his  anomalous  "government" 
was  allowed  to  exist.  When  France  got  a  free  hand, 
and  Great  Britain  stood  behind  her  by  preventing 
Germany  from  assuming  the  traditional  role  she  her- 
self had  abdicated,  the  Sultan  was  brought  face  to 
face  for  the  first  time  with  the  necessity  of  represent- 
ing geographical  Morocco.  He  was  asked  to  accept 
responsibility  for  and  to  act  for  tribes  that  did  not 
recognize  his  authority  and  had  not  recognized  the 
authority  of  his  ancestors. 

Spain  and  France,  neighbors  of  this  country  of 
anarchy,  had  wars  with  Morocco  in  the  nineteenth 
century.  In  both  cases,  England 'interfered  to  pre- 
vent them  from  securing  the  amelioration  of  the  evils 
on  account  of  which  they  had  fought.  The  Moroccan 
question  became  international  in  1880,  when  Eng- 
land and  Spain,  in  an  attempt  to  prevent  France  from 
taking  the  measures  that  were  necessary  (and  which 
she  had  treaty  right  to  take)  to  protect  her  Algerian 
frontier  from  tribal  raids,  called  the  Madrid  Confer- 
ence.   Although  France  was  vigorously  supported 

360 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


by  the  German  delegates,  British  opposition  com- 
pelled her  to  give  up  her  ancient  treaty  rights  in 
Morocco.  The  foundation  of  the  internationaliza- 
tion of  Morocco  was  laid.  British  diplomacy  had 
only  one  thought,  to  prevent  France  or  Spain  from 
getting  a  fortified  foothold  opposite  Gibraltar.  In 
all  the  Morocco  agreements  the  British  Foreign  Office 
has  invariably  insisted  that  France  and  Spain  bind 
themselves  not  to  follow  the  British  example  of 
putting  fortifications  in  the  Strait  of  Gibraltar.  The 
fact  of  Great  Britain,  perched  on  the  big  rock  in 
Spanish  territory,  forbidding  Spain  to  fortify  the 
African  side  of  the  strait,  illustrates  the  world-old 
axiom  that  a  nation's  territorial  rights  are  founded 
on  force  and  maintained  by  force.  The  British  took 
Gibraltar  by  force.  They  are  there  only  by  right  of 
force.  They  will  stay  there  as  long  as  they  have  the 
force  to  defend  Gibraltar.  And  as  long  as  they  have 
the  force  they  will  prevent  others  from  imitating 
their  example  on  the  African  side  of  the  Strait  of 
Gibraltar  or  anywhere  else  in  the  world. 

British  diplomacy  anticipated  in  1844  and  i860 
the  German  attempts  of  1906  and  191 1,  the  difference 
being  that  the  British  succeeded  where  the  Germans 
failed.  In  1844,  Great  Britain  prevented  France 
_  from  extending  her  protectorate  over  Morocco.  In 
i860,  she  prevented  Spain  from  extending  her  pro- 
tectorate over  Morocco.  Both  times  she  would 
have  fought,  if  the  rival  had  not  given  way.  Several 
times  the  British  tried  to  extend  their  protectorate 
over  Morocco,  and  would  have  fought  any  Power 
that  opposed  the  project.    The  British  flag  does  not 

361 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


wave  over  Morocco  now,  only  because  Sir  Evan 
Smith  could  not  persuade  the  father  of  the  present 
sultan  to  accept  a  protectorate,'  and  the  London 
Cabinet  did  not  dispose  of  the  forces  and  ships  that 
would  be  required  to  conquer  the  country.  But  if 
there  had  been  extensive  gold  mines  in  the  country 
to  make  the  conquest  worth  while,  the  pourparlers 
of  1892  would  probably  have  ended  by  Hassan  yield- 
ing to  force. 

The  Moroccan  crisis,  which  was  to  bring  about 
momentous  results  for  the  world,  began  in  1901  with 
the  occupation  by  French  troops  of  the  oasis  of  Twat, 
on  the  northern  edge  of  the  Sahara  Desert  in  the 
undefined  hinterland  between  Morocco  and  Algeria. 
When  one  studies  the  map,  with  the  plan  of  French 
penetration  across  the  Sahara  and  the  protection  of 
the  Senegal-Niger  Colony  in  mind,  and  considers  also 
that  the  administrative  organization  of  the  Algerian 
hinterland  was  an  imperative  necessity  for  the  peace 
and  prosperity  of  Algeria  and  Tunis,  France  cannot 
be  accused  of  wanting  to  provoke  the  Sultan  or  of 
infringing  upon  his  rights.  But  it  was  unfavorably 
commented  upon  by  France's  rivals,  and  things  were 
whispered  in  the  ear  of  Abdul  Aziz.  In  the  same 
year  the  assassination  of  a  French  colonist  of  Oran 
brought  an  ultimatum  to  the  Sultan,  supported  by 
two  warships  at  Tangier.  In  spite  of  Anglo-German 
opposition,  the  Sultan  made  two  agreements  in  April 
and  May,  1902,  which  opened  up  the  way  for  France 
to  interfere  in  the  internal  management  of  Morocco. 
France  and  the  Government  of  the  Sultan  were  to 

"  C/.  Bernard's  Le  Maroc  (Mean,  Paris,  1915)  p.  316. 

362 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


work  in  accord  in  the  frontier  regions  in  matters 
concerning  police,  commerce,  and  customs.  After 
repeated  tribal  raids  on  the  frontier  showed  the 
inability — if  not  the  ill  will — of  the  Moroccan  Gov- 
ernment to  Uve  up  to  the  agreements  it  had  made,  M. 
Jonnart,  Governor-General  of  Algeria,  called  Colonel 
Lyautey  in  1903  to  undertake  the  task  of  pacifying 
the  hinterland  of  Oran  and  of  making  the  Algerian 
frontier  secure  against  raids  from  Morocco.  As 
just  as  he  was  strict,  as  judicious  as  he  was  energetic, 
as  cool-headed  as  he  was  enthusiastic,  Colonel  Ly- 
autey developed  in  his  task  diplomatic  and  military 
qualities  that  have  brought  him  a  seat  in  the  French 
Academy,  a  generalship  in  the  army,  and  the  mission 
of  making  Morocco  French. 

From  1 90 1,  when  France  determined  to  make  her 
African  Empire  what  it  could  become,  the  French 
attitude  toward  Morocco  was  logical  and  justifiable. 
When  Colonel  Lyautey  took  charge  of  the  frontier 
forces,  it  became  energetic  and  unyielding.  What 
France  asked  for  she  had  a  right  to  expect' — that  the 
Sultan  of  Morocco  should  exercise  effective  control 
over  the  tribes  that  were  threatening  the  security  and 
disturbing  the  prosperity  of  Algeria  and  the  Algerian 
hinterland,  or  refrain  from  opposing  France  in  taking 
the  necessary  military  measures  to  call  the  Moorish 
tribes  to  order.  From  the  French  point  of  view,  the 
line  of  argument  to  justify  a  "violation  "  of  the  Moor- 
ish frontier  was  unanswerable.  If  Morocco  meant 
a  definite  geographical  territory,  the  Government  of 
Morocco  was  responsible  for  what  happened  in  that 
territory.    If  the  Sultan  answered  that  he  'was  re- 

3^^3 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


sponsible  only  for  the  acts  of  the  Makhzen,  i.  e.,  the 
submitted  tribes,  France  was  not  attacking  his  sover- 
eignty or  his  Government,  when  she  punished  un- 
submitted  tribes,  i.  e.,  the  Siba,  and  occupied  their 
territories. 

The  difficulty  of  France  lay  not  with  Abdul  Aziz 
and  his  native  advisers,  but  with  Kaid  Maclean,  the 
Instructor-General  of  the  Moorish  army,  a  Scotch 
adventurer  in  the  pay  of  the  British  Foreign  Office,  ^ 
and  the  British  Minister  at  Tangier.  As  long  as 
these  two  men,  aided  by  the  German  Minister,  kept 
telling  Abdul  Aziz  that  it  was  his  duty  and  his  right 
to  oppose  the  French  thesis,  France  could  be  put 
before  the  world — even  before  her  own  people — as  an 
aggressor,  trying  to  bully  the  poor  weak  Moslem 
sovereign  of  the  one  remaining  independent  Moslem 
State  of  Africa. 

The  Sultan  Abdul  Aziz,  son  and  successor  of  Has- 
san, was  an  ignorant  and  weak-minded  young  man, 
who  might  have  lasted  for  a  lifetime  as  nominal  ruler 
of  Morocco,  supporting  his  authority  upon  the  re- 
ligious chiefs  and  expecting  only  homage  and  little 

■  Sir  Harry  Maclean  was  formerly  an  officer  in  the  59th  Regiment, 

stationed  at  Gibraltar,  who  secured  a  temporary  appointment  with 
Sultan  Hassan  to  organize  his  army.  When  he  saw  how  nicely  his 
bread  was  buttered  in  Morocco,  Maclean  decided  to  cast  in  his  for- 
tunes with  the  country.  He  acted  as  tout  for  concession  hunters 
and  other  grafters,  who  wanted  to  get  the  ear  of  the  Sultan.  He  was 
the  pillar  of  strength  upon  whom  the  British  Legation  at  Tangier 
depended  to  keep  French  officers  out  of  the  Moorish  army,  and  to 
block  the  French  proposals  to  establish  a  joint  Franco-Moorish 
police  control  over  the  tribes  that  were  opposing  the  French  admini- 
strative organization  of  the  Algerian  hinterland  and  the  western 
Sahara. 

364 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


money  from  the  Makhzen  tribes.  But  he  was  in- 
capable of  seeing  through  the  European  intrigues  and 
of  avoiding  the  traps  that  were  set  for  him.  His 
brothers  and  other  chieftains  were  bribed  by  Euro- 
pean agents  to  conspire  and  revolt  against  him ;  the 
leaders  of  his  army  and  his  ministers  drew  subsidies 
from  Tangier  Legations;  and  tribes  were  instigated 
to  attack  him,  to  attack  the  French  and  the  Spanish, 
and  to  kidnap  European  subjects.  Nothing  was 
too  petty  or  too  mean  to  be  left  undone  by 
agents  of  European  diplomatic  representatives.  The 
worst  of  all,  however,  was  the  way  Abdul  Aziz's 
credulity  was  imposed  upon  by  concession  hunters 
and  merchants,  who  involved  him  in  diplomatic 
controversies  and  in  debts.  Like  Khedive  Ismail  of 
Egypt,  he  fell  an  easy  prey  to  the  European  adven- 
turers that  surrounded  him,  and  with  whom  his 
Ministers  and  favorites  were  in  connivance  and 
shared  ill-gotten  profits.  His  concessions  and  his 
extravagances  gave  the  Powers  the  opportunity  to 
interfere  in  the  domestic  affairs  of  Morocco,  Out  of 
the  money  he  borrowed,  Abdul  Aziz  got  absolutely 
nothing  cither  for  himself  or  for  his  country.  During 
his  reign,  Morocco  fell  into  the  clutches  of  European 
money-lenders.  But  no  harbors  were  constructed; 
no  roads  or  railways  were  built;  and  Abdul  Aziz 
never  occupied  himself  in  any  way  with  public  works 
of  any  kind. 

Abdul  Aziz's  purchases  were  of  the  most  foolish 
and  useless  and  naive  character.  An  adventurer 
interested  him  in  photography.  He  bought  cameras 
by  the  hundred,  films  by  the  thousand,  and  dcvclop- 

365 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ing  materials  one  might  say  almost  by  the  laboratory! 
He  took  only  a  few  pictures,  and  then  gave  up  photo- 
graphy, because,  as  he  confided  to  a  friend,  he  found 
it  was  too  expensive  even  for  a  Sultan.  When  he 
wanted  a  grand  piano,  he  was  told  that  pianos  could 
be  purchased  only  by  the  dozen  at  fifteen  hundred 
dollars  apiece.  He  was  deeply  interested  in  moving 
pictures,  and  had  his  own  agents  securing  the  best 
films  for  him  in  Europe.  Once  he  invited  a  friend 
to  see  King  Edward's  coronation  in  Westminster 
Abbey.  It  was  a  wretched  fake,  with  painted  back- 
ground and]  third-rate  actors.  He  told  the  friend 
in  all  seriousness  that  this  was  the  only  film  that  had 
been  taken  inside  the  Abbey,  and  that  he  had  to  pay 
a  bribe  of  several  hundred  pounds  to  the  Dean  of 
Westminster  to  get  his  operator  introduced  and  hidden 
in  the  gallery  over  the  choir.  Once,  when  he  was 
going  from  Fez  to  Tangier,  he  met  a  caravan  of 
camels  carrying  his  latest  shipment  of  grand  pianos. 
In  the  pouring  rain,  he  had  one  of  the  pianos  un- 
packed and  set  up  by  the  roadside.  He  went  up  to 
it,  singing  la-la-la.  On  the  third  la,  he  struck  a 
key  of  the  piano  with  his  index  finger.  Then  he  went 
on  his  way  to  Tangier.  What  remains  of  the  Stein- 
way  Grand  is  still  there  by  the  roadside. 

The  beginning  of  the  end  in  Morocco  came  two 
years  before  the  Anglo-French  Agreement,  with  the 
revolt  of  Bu  Hamara  against  the  Sultan.  In  October, 
1902,  Bu  Hamara  pretended  that  he  was  Mohammed, 
brother  of  Abdul  Aziz  and  son  of  the  late  Hassan. 
He  claimed  to  be  the  rightful  heir  to  the  throne  and 
rallied  around  him  the  tribes  who  were  beginning  to 

366 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


be  alarmed  by  the  European  intrigues.  His  poKcy 
was  anti-European,  and  he  asserted  that  Abdul  Aziz 
had  forfeited  all  rights  to  the  throne  by  conspir- 
ing with  the  foreign  infidels  to  the  detriment  of  the 
Shereefian  Empire.  Although  Mohammed  was  ac- 
tually alive  at  the  time,  a  prisoner  of  his  brother,  the 
claims  of  Bu  Hamara  were  accepted  by  many  tribes. 
One  cannot,  in  the  absence  of  facts,  assert  that  Bu 
Hamara  was  instigated  by  the  French.  But  it  is 
none  the  less  true  that  his  action  gave  to  France  the 
opening  she  had  long  been  looking  for.  France  pro- 
posed to  send  troops  to  Morocco  to  put  down  the 
insurrection  of  Bu  Hamara.  It  was  represented  to 
Abdul  Aziz  by  the  British  and  German  Ministers  that 
consent  to  this  proposition  would  be  looked  upon  by 
his  subjects  as  substantiating  the  very  charge  that 
Bu  Hamara  made  against  him.  So  French  assist- 
ance was  refused. 

During  1903,  Morocco  fell  into  a  state  of  complete 
anarchy.  The  insurrection  spread  alarmingly.  In 
spite  of  serious  reverses,  Abdul  Aziz  kept  his  throne. 
There  was  no  unity  among  his  opponents,  and  he 
was  able  to  borrow  money  to  bribe  important  re- 
ligious chiefs.  The  Government  troops  were  not 
regularly  paid.  Although  there  was  considerable 
revenue  from  the  customs,  his  bribes  and  his  indul- 
gence in  personal  luxuries  soon  plunged  Abdul  Aziz 
hopelessly  into  debt.  Creditors,  through  their  Lega- 
tions, began  to  press  him. 

In  order  to  obtain  food  for  her  troops  at  Melilla, 
Spain  was  compelled  to  acknowledge  Bu  Hamara  as 
Sultan.    It  was  in  this  region  that  the  Pretender  was 

367 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


strongest,  and  he  had  the  Spanish  at  his  mercy. 
Spain,  in  return  for  her  recognition,  secured  from  Bu 
Hamara  mining  concessions  which  were  afterwards 
the  subject  of  much  discussion  with  France,  and  were 
finally  disallowed.  Germany  and  England  had  no 
direct  interest  in  the  revolution  of  Bu  Hamara.  For 
it  affected  only  the  district  between  Fez  and  the 
Algerian  frontier.  But  they  watched  its  progress 
none  the  less  with  anxiety,  for  they  saw  in  the  re- 
sultant anarchy  an  excuse  for  France  to  intervene. 

At  this  critical  moment,  the  Anglo-French  Agree- 
ment of  April  8,  1904,  was  signed.  France  and 
Britain  agreed  to  let  each  other  have  a  free  hand  in 
Egypt.  Abdul  Aziz  found  himself  suddenly  deserted 
by  -  England.  The  British  Minister,  who  had  all 
along  been  warning  him  against  the  French  and  urg- 
ing him  to  resist  their  intervention,  which  could  lead 
only  to  the  destroying  of  Moorish  independence, 
turned  overnight  the  deaf  ear  to  his  appeals.  The 
Sultan  was ;  advised  to  make  what  terms  he]  could 
with  France.  Abdul  Aziz  could  look  now  only  to 
Germany. 

The  English  in  Morocco  were  very  bitter  against 
their  Government  and  just  as  hostile  to  the  Entente 
Cordiale  as  were  the  Germans.  Even  now,  more 
than  a  decade  later,  when  England  and  France  are 
united  in  the  Great  War,  it  is  not  impossible  to  find 
British  residents  of  Morocco  who  feel  still  that  their 
interests  were  sacrificed  in  a  "deal"  of  international 
politics,  of  which  the  advantages  to  them  were  nil. 
For  one  must  remember  that  British  merchants  and 
British  trade  have  never  prospered  in  French  colo- 

368 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


nies.  No  matter  what  assurances  have  been  made  to 
them,  the  British  in  Morocco  tell  you  that  sooner  or 
later  they  will  labor  under  the  same  disadvantages 
of  the  closed  door  that  foreigners  find  in  Algeria, 
Tunis,  Madagascar,  and  Indo-China. 

It  is  claimed  by  British  writers  that  the  Germans 
had  no  ground  whatever  for  complaint  when  the 
Anglo-French  Agreement  about  Egypt  and  Morocco 
was  signed,  and  that  no  privileges  would  accrue  to  the 
French  and  British  merchants  and  goods  in  the 
countries  whose  fate  was  sealed  by  this  Agreement, 
that  would  not  accrue  equally  to  German  merchants 
and  German  goods.  This  is  not  strictly  true.  In 
the  Agreement,  Great  Britain  protected  her  mer- 
chants from  the  contingency  of  French  railways  into 
eastern  Morocco  turning  trade  through  Algerian 
ports  to  the  sole  advantage  of  France,  by  exacting  a 
clause  that  British  goods  could  travel  over  Algerian 
railways  into  Morocco  without  paying  Algerian  duties. 
The  French,  in  return,  received  the  same  privilege 
on  Egyptian  railways  leading  into  the  Sudan.  This 
is  but  one  instance  of  how  an  agreement  of  this 
character  discriminates  against  the  commerce  of  a 
third  nation,  even  where  the  principle  of  the  open 
door  is  asserted  to  have  been  maintained.  If  British 
merchants  and  residents  of  Morocco,  and  French 
merchants  and  residents  of  Egypt,  protected  by 
a  mutual  dual  engagement,  were  bitter  against  the 
Agreement  of  1904,  is  it  unreasonable  that  Germans 
should  find  cause  for  complaint  and  should  appeal 
to  their  Government  to  defend  their  interests  in  the 
few  places  still  left  open  to  them  in  the  world?  Then, 
34  369 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


too,  we  should  never  forget  that  however  much  we 
say  to  a  foreigner  that  he  is  at  home  in  otu*  midst,  he, 
on  his  side,  feels  a  foreigner  still.  He  is  under  the 
perpetual  menace  of  a  sudden  change  in  his  status, 
such  as  occiured  in  both  Egypt  and  Morocco  at  the 
beginning  of  this  war.^  Even  when  peace  is  ar- 
ranged, he  will  feel  that  he  has  not  exactly  the  same 
privileges  and  advantages  that  are  accorded  to 
merchants  and  traders  of  the  nation  whose  flag  flies 
over  the  territory  where  he  is  working.  It  is  no 
argument  against  this  to  point  out  the  success  of 
Germans  in  British  colonies:  for  that  success  has 
been  largely  won  by  greater  efforts  and  greater  ability 
in  spite  of  unfavorable  circumstances.  And  as 
regards  French  colonies,  EngHsh  merchants  and 
traders  have  only  to  consider  their  own  experience  to 
realize  why  the  Germans  were  justified  in  protesting 
against  Morocco  becoming  a  French  colony. 

Abdul  Aziz  had  little  faith,  after  the  desertion  of 
England,  in  German  support.  It  was  too  intangible 
— mere  words — and  the  British  Legation,  untroubled 
by  such  a  little  thing  as  inconsistency,  now  began  to 
urge  him  strongly  to  play  up  to  the  French.  His 
incHnation  was  to  compromise  with  the  French  to 
save  his  throne.  But  he  was  too  weak,  and  too  afraid 
to  act,  to  change  circumstances. 

The  month  after  the  signing  of  the  Anglo-French 
Agreement,  France  had  an  excellent  opportunity  to 

»  The  Johannesburg  riots  in  May,  1915,  resulted  in  property 
damage  to  German  firms  and  residents  of  two  and  a  half  million 
dollars.  The  majority  of  the  sufferers  had  settled  in  the  Transvaal 
before  the  British  conquest. 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


show  internationally  her  position  as  "predominant 
Power."  The  famous  Raisiili  captured  two  Euro- 
peans, one  a  Greek  who  was  a  naturalized  American, 
and  the  other  a  Britisher.  Algerian  police  were 
landed  at  Tangier,  and  other  steps  taken  to  "pre- 
serve order"  in  the  bandit-ridden  neighborhood  of 
Tangier,  where  order  had  never  existed.  A  few 
months  earher,  such  a  step  would  have  been  greeted 
by  an  indignant  outcry  in  the  London  press.  The 
new  word  of  order  having  gone  out  from  Downing 
Street,  the  "French  protective  measure"  was  sym- 
pathetically recorded  and  commented  upon. '  Abdul 
Aziz  avoided  complications  with  Americans  and 
British  by  buying  the  release  of  the  prisoners  from 
Raisuli,  and  agreeing  to  other  conditions  imposed  by 
Raisuli,  which  amounted  virtually  to  an  abdication 
of  all  pretense  to  sovereignty  in  the  Mediterranean 
and  Gibraltar  regions  of  Morocco.  In  December, 
1904,  the  French,  alarmed  by  the  growing  anti-French 
feeling  among  all  the  different  elements  in  Mo- 
rocco, Siba  as  well  as  Makhzen,  increased  their  troops 
at  Tangier  and  sent  a  detachment  to  Rabat  on  the 
Atlantic  coast.  All  Europeans  were  ordered  by  their 
Consuls  to  leave  Fez,  and  a  French  invasion  of 
Morocco  was  predicted. 

But  France  still  stuck  to  diplomacy.  Bu  Hamara 
and  Raisuli,  bitterly  opposed  as  they  were  to  Abdul 

«  A  study  of  Reuter's  Agency  telegrams  at  this  period  shows 
how  important  it  is  for  the  American  press  to  endeavor  to  become 
independent  of  London  in  presenting  foreign  news  to  the  public. 
Our  Associated  Press  gives  Reutcr  telegrams  to  its  subscribers  with- 
out independent  verification  and  no  indication  of  the  source. 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Aziz,  might  easily  be  led  to  join  the  Makhzen  tribes 
in  rallying  to  the  Sultan's  support,  if  the  French 
precipitated  matters  by  force.  A  mission  was  sent 
at  the  beginning  of  1905  to  Fez  to  urge  upon  the  Sul- 
tan a  scheme  of  reforming  Morocco,  in  which  France 
would  be  the  adviser  and  "elder  brother"  of  the 
Sultan.  The  Berber  tribes,  incensed  against  France 
for  having  extended  her  aggression  from  Twat  into 
the  Figuig  region,  refused  to  obey  a  summons  from 
Abdul  Aziz  to  attend  a  Divan  to  "discuss  the  French 
proposals."  They  warned  Abdul  Aziz  against  listen- 
ing to  the  treacherous  words  of  the  infidel.  Most  of 
the  religious  and  tribal  chiefs,  however,  assembled  at 
Fez.  The  Divan,  like  all  Oriental  assemblies,  was 
convoked  for  the  purpose  of  assenting  without  discus- 
sion to  the  conclusion  put  before  it  by  the  Government. 

At  this  moment  occurred  the  first  German  interven- 
tion, of  which  so  much  has  been  written.  Germany 
was  not  a  party  to  the  Anglo-French  Agreement. 
She  had  no  reason,  then,  to  cease  suddenly,  as  Great 
Britain  had  done,  her  interest  in  preserving  the 
political  and  territorial  integrity  of  Morocco.  On 
March  31,  1905,  Kaiser  Wilhelm  landed  at  Tangier, 
sent  greetings  to  Abdul  Aziz  of  Morocco,  and  let  it 
be  known  in  no  uncertain  terms  that  he  regarded 
Morocco  as  an  independent  country,  and  intended, 
in  spite  of  the  English  defection,  to  continue  to  sup- 
port the  Sultan  against  intrigues  that  were  threaten- 
ing to  destroy  him  and  his  country.  The  Kaiser's 
visit  to  Morocco  was  only  for  two  hours,  but  it  gave 
Abdul  Aziz  and  his  Ministers  courage  to  resist  the 
demands  of  the  French  Mission.    On  May  28th,  the 

372 


EUROPEAN  RIVALRY  IN  MOROCCO 


Sultan  formerly  rejected  the  French  proposals,  re- 
ferring to  the  decision  of  the  Divan  as  the  ground 
of  their  non  possumus. 

The  Government  of  the  Makhzen,  accepting  the 
suggestion  of  the  German  Minister,  proposed  an  in- 
•temational  Conference  of  all  the  Powers  to  decide 
upon  the  status  of  Morocco  before  the  world.  The 
British  Foreign  Office  refused  to  accept  the  Confer- 
ence, unless  France  were  willing.  M.  Delcasse 
strongly  advised  the  French  Cabinet  to  refuse  the 
proposal  for  a  conference,  no  matter  what  might 
happen.  His  colleagues,  however,  fearing  a  war  with 
Germany  for  which  they  were  not  prepared  and  on 
an  issue  that  was  not  clear  to  their  own  electorate, 
much  less  to  the  world,  did  not  see  their  way  clear 
to  follow  the  Foreign  Minister's  advice.  M.  Delcasse 
resigned.  This  was  the  beginning  of  the  actual  gather- 
ing of  the  war  clouds  that  were  to  break  a  decade  later. 

The  Conference  was  first  set  for  Tangier,  after 
long  negotiations  between  the  Powers  and  Morocco. 
During  these  negotiations,  Abdul  Aziz  borrowed  two 
and  a  half  million  dollars  from  German  financiers, 
and  gave  to  German  contractors  the  concession  for 
harbor  work  at  Tangier.  Bu  Hamara  continued  his 
war  against  the  Sultan,  and  it  was  believed  that  he 
might — perhaps  with  the  connivance  of  the  Makhzen 
— make  some  coup  that  would  upset  European  calcu- 
lations before  the  Conference  met.  The  Oriental  delay 
of  the  Moors  caused  the  postponement  of  the  Confer- 
ence, and  Bu  Hamara's  activity  a  change  of  its  place  of 
meeting.  It  was  set  finally  for  January  i6,  1906,  at 
Algeciras,  a  town  on  the  Spanish  coast  near  Gibraltar. 

373 


CHAPTER  XIX 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 

THE  Conference  of  Algeciras,  and  the  Act 
which  its  delegates  drew  up  after  long  and 
unedifying  bickering,  belongs  to  European 
rather  than  African  history.  I  have  dealt  with  it 
from  the  European  standpoint,  and  given  the  main 
provisions  of  the  Act,  in  an  earlier  volume.'  The 
Act  was  unsatisfactory  and  futile,  as  are  all  interna- 
tional compromises  that  do  not  meet  issues  squarely. 
Instead  of  establishing  definitely  the  status  and 
privileges  of  France  and  Spain  in  Morocco  under 
international  sanction,  and  requiring  of  these  two 
states  an  absolutely  restrictive  pledge  to  abide 
loyally  by  the  status  and  keep  loyally  within  the 
privileges,  France  and  Spain  were  given  police  powers 
that  might  be  interpreted  by  either  more  widely 
than  the  Act  intended,  without  ground  for  accusa- 
tion of  violation  of  the  Agreement  and  of  breach  of 
good  faith.  One  can  argue  with  equal  force  that 
it  was  a  diplomatic  defeat  for  Germany  and  a  diplo- 
matic defeat  for  France.  Had  German  diplomats 
been  sure  of  popular  support  at  home,  they  would 
have  insisted  upon  a  much  more  strict  limitation 
'  See  my  New  Map  of  Europe,  pp.  71-83. 

374 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


and  definition  of  the  powers  entrusted  to  France  and 
to  Spain.  Had  French  diplomats  been  assured  of 
British  backing,  they  would  have  refused  to  sign 
the  Act.  But  German  pubHc  opinion  was  not  con- 
vinced of  the  wisdom  of  showing  the  mailed  fist 
over  Morocco,  which  interested  the  Germans  very 
little  indeed:  and  the  new  Liberal  Government  in 
Great  Britain  was  not  in  a  position  to  promise  France 
more  than  "sympathy." 

Delegates  left  Algeciras  without  having  accom- 
pHshed  the  purpose  for  which  they  had  come.  In 
Germany,  a  storm  of  condemnation  and  ridicule 
met  the  announcement  of  the  "decision"  of  the 
Conference.  Those  in  France  who  cared  at  all 
were  determined  to  ignore  the  Act.  Spain,  instead 
of  having  clearly  defined  rights  by  international 
agreement,  was  left  to  negotiate  separately  with 
France. 

Germany's  interests  in  Morocco,  in  spite  of  all 
the  hubbub  of  the  Mannesmanns  and  the  solicitude 
of  Dr.  Rosen,  were  slight,  potentially  as  well  as 
actually.  From  the  moment  the  Act  of  Algeciras 
was  signed  her  statesmen  and  the  Colonial  Party  and 
the  Navy  League  regarded  Morocco  as  the  means  of 
working  upon  the  German  electorate.  They  put 
forward  the  question  of  principle.  Germany  must 
have  her  place  in  the  sun.  She  was  not  going  to 
take  away  by  force  the  colonies  of  others,  but  she 
was  going  to  prevent  others  from  extending  their  po- 
litical sovereignty  over  territories  not  yet  "grabbed," 
without  Germany's  consent  and  without  giving 
Germany  "compensations"  elsewhere.  Morocco 

375 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


was  to  be  used  to  get  increased  budget  grants  for 
the  colonies,  the  army,  and  the  navy.  French 
statesmen  and  imperiahsts  were  equally  alive  to 
the  possibility  of  using  Morocco  to  work  upon  their 
electorate  in  exactly  the  same  way.  They  began  to 
enlighten  the  French  nation  on  the  value — no,  more, 
the  necessity — of  Morocco  in  defending  what  France 
had  already  won  and  built  in  North  Africa.  They 
could  put  forth  logically,  truthfully,  and  telHngly 
the  menace  to  the  security  and  prosperity  of  Algeria 
and  Tunis  and  of  the  recently  created  West  Africa 
from  anarchy  in  Morocco  and  a  spread  of  Islamic 
agitation.  Events  since  1900  could  be  cited  to 
prove  the  wisdom  of  having  occupied  Tunis,  one  of 
the  keys  of  the  house.  Morocco,  the  other  key, 
must  also  be  taken. 

At  the  bottom  of  the  Morocco  question  was  the 
gulf  that  had  been  made  between  the  two  nations 
by  the  Treaty  of  Frankfort.  The  unity  and  pros- 
perity of  Germany  was  dependent  upon  maintaining 
that  Treaty.  France  would  never  be  "France  her- 
self again  "  imtil  the  lost  provinces  had  been  returned. 
The  North  African  Empire,  moreover,  was  the 
Third  RepubHc's  consolation  for  Alsace  and  Lor- 
raine. Was  Germany  now  threatening  to  take  that 
also  from  France?  The  fuel  for  keeping  the  Morocco 
question  alive,  then,  was  the  mutual  animosity 
between  France  and  Germany.  But  the  Germans 
did  not  feel  as  intensely  as  the  French  until  the 
Morocco  question  proved  that  the  British  were 
standing  behind  the  French.  The  present  war 
had  multiple  causes.    Morocco,  however,  can  un- 

376 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


hesitatingly  be  called  a  principal  cause.  On  both 
sides  of  the  Rhine,  the  Socialists  foresaw  this,  and 
feared  it.  Before  and  after  Agadir,  they  worked 
hard  to  prevent  the  catastrophe.  Without  the 
Balkan  troubles,  they  might  have  succeeded.  When 
they  were  taxed  with  lack  of  patriotism,  they  stuck 
by  their  guns  without  wavering.  Only  to  avoid 
the  shameful  epithet  of  traitors  did  they  finally 
weaken  and  give  in.  When  they  were  opposing  an 
aggressive  colonial  pohcy,  increase  of  standing  army, 
increase  of  navy,  and  the  huge  budget  estimates  of 
latter  years  for  shot  and  shell  and  cannon,  the  Social- 
ists beHeved  they  were  combating  chauvinism  and 
not  patriotism.  In  England,  also,  independent 
thinkers,  advanced  Radicals,  and  labor  leaders 
fought  jingoism,  and  sustained  the  thesis  that  war  is 
the  spontaneous  combustioti  that  occurs  when  materials 
for  making  it  are  gathered.  In  the  midst  of  the 
conflict.  Socialists  and  Radicals  and  dreamers  are 
anathematized.  Events,  they  are  told,  have  proved 
the  foUy  of  their  thesis.  The  roar  of  the  gathered 
materials  drowns  their  answer.  But  will  not  the 
historian  give  them  reason? 

Would  Germany  have  been  satisfied  in  the  long 
nm,  if  France  had  abided  loyally  by  the  provisions 
of  the  Act  of  Algeciras?  Did  German  intrigues  in 
Morocco  induce,  if  not  compel,  France  to  refuse  to 
abide  by  the  provisions  of  the  Act?  These  vital 
questions  are  answered  by  the  polemicists'  in  a 

'  There  are  polemicists  among  European  writers  only  since  1906. 
The  best  independent  discussion  of  Alfjcciras  and  tlie  years  of  ten- 
sion following  it  are  found  in  Arthur  Dullard's  Tiw  Diplomacy  of 

377 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


totally  contradictory  manner.  Algeciras  was  a 
defeat  for  both  France  and  Germany,  as  every  com- 
promise is  a  defeat  for  those  who  are  advocating 
opposite  solutions.  Germany  wanted  the  complete 
independence  of  the  Shereefian  Empire,  and  the 
refusal  to  acknowledge  superior  or  "particular" 
interests  of  any  Power  or  Powers.  France  wanted 
the  free  hand  that  she  afterwards  boldly  took. 
The  Powers  signed  an  Act  which,  if  the  letter  had 
been  taken,  would  have  prevented  France  from 
inheriting  Morocco.  On  the  other  hand,  the  par- 
ticular interests  of  France  in  Morocco  were  acknow- 
ledged by  the  Powers. 

Sultan  Abdul  Aziz  resented  keenly  the  Conference 
at  Algeciras.  His  feeling  about  the  gratuitous 
assumption  of  the  Powers  to  the  right  to  decide  the 
destinies  of  his  Empire  were  shared  by  every  religious 
and  pohtical  chief  in  Morocco.  There  was  no 
formidable  and  united  resistance  on  the  part  of  the 
Moors  and  Berbers  to  repudiate  the  Act.  But, 
just  as  has  happened  in  other  Moslem  lands  when 
Europe  took  advantage  of  weakness,  anti-infidel 
feeling  was  aroused.  There  had  not  been  before 
Algeciras  opposition  to  Europeans  on  rehgious 
grounds.  Intelligent  Moors  realized  that  Morocco 
must  fall  under  European  influence.  But  they 
determined  to  postpone  the  evil  day  when  their 
habits  and  usages  of  centuries  would  be  rudely  up- 


the  Great  War,  a  notable  book  that  well  deserves  the  careful  study 
of  students  of  contemporary  history.  Mr.  Bullard  has  a  better 
first  hand  knowledge  of  Morocco  than  any  other  American  writer. 

378 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


set  by  the  imposition  of  an  alien  and  infidel  yoke. 
Europeans  who  believe  that  Moslem  impotence  and 
fatalistic  acquiescence  to  foreign  domination  means 
indifference  sadly  delude  themselves.  The  delusion 
may  some  day  bring  disastrous  results.  For  the 
people  whom  they  rule  are  not  reconciled  to  the 
humiliation  of  being  a  subject  race.  I  have  seen 
at  close  range  in  many  countries  what  is  called 
Moslem  fanaticism.  I  believe  firmly  that  this 
miscalled  fanaticism  is  not  due  to  religion.  Moslems 
hate  Christians  because  they  believe  that  Christians 
have  taken  advantage  of  their  political  weakness. 
They  resent  our  assumption  of  superiority,  and  await 
with  burning  eagerness  the  day  when  they  are  able 
to  strike,  and  strike  to  kill.  Their  impotence  is  due 
to  their  inability  to  understand  the  meaning  of 
solidarity.  But  those  who  live  in  Islamic  countries 
are  never  free  from  the  shadow  of  the  menace  of  an 
uprising. 

Had  they  been  able  to  unite  in  action,  as  they 
were  united  in  spirit,  the  Moors  could  undoubtedly 
have  presented  so  formidable  a  barrier  to  French 
penetration  that  France  would  have  hesitated  to 
undertake  what  she  had  in  mind.  But  Abdul  Aziz 
was  not  the  man  who  could  rally  around  his  throne 
tribes  that  had  never  acknowledged  his  authorit3% 
and  that  were  traditionally  hostile  to  each  other  as 
well  as  to  the  Makhzen.  The  internal  condition 
of  Morocco  made  impossible  internal  reform.  We 
must  not  forget  that  even  if  the  French  had  been 
imbued  with  good-will  and  the  best  intentions  in 
the  world  toward  Abdul  Aziz  and  his  government, 

379 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


they  realized  that  treating  with  him  as  responsible 
sovereign  of  the  whole  country  would  have  been 
much  like  President  Wilson  treating  with  Carranza 
when  Huerta  and  Villa  were  in  the  field.  Bu  Hamara 
was  still  powerful.  Raisuli  was  master  of  the 
Tangier  district,  and  at  the  end  of  1906,  Abdul  Aziz's 
brother,  Hafid,  rebelled  against  him  with  the  inten- 
tion of  deposing  him.  Abdul  Aziz  had  sent  a  repre- 
sentative to  Tangier  to  negotiate  "practical  measures 
of  reform"  with  the  Ministers  of  all  the  Powers, 
ignoring  the  special  position  of  France.  But  the 
Europeans  in  the  coast  ports  were  under  French 
and  Spanish  protection,  and  Abdul  Aziz  could 
put  in  the  field  an  army  of  only  three  thousand 
men. 

In  January,  1907,  Abdul  Aziz  appealed  to  the 
Tangier  Legation  for  a  loan  to  maintain  his  forces 
against  Hafid,  Raisuli,  and  Bu  Hamara.  In  March, 
after  a  French  physician  had  been  assassinated  and 
the  British  Consular  Agency  attacked  at  Marakesh, 
France  crossed  the  Rubicon.  The  Ujda  district 
on  the  Algerian  frontier  was  occupied.  Events 
moved  fast.  When  Abdul  Aziz  issued  an  edict 
calling  upon  the  people  to  remain  quiet,  and  pro- 
tested to  Europe  against  the  occupation  of  Ujda  as 
a  violation  of  all  treaties,  Hafid  was  proclaimed 
Sultan  at  Marakesh.  European  control  of  customs 
was  established  to  protect  the  creditors  of  Abdul , 
Aziz.  This  led  to  an  anti-European  outbreak  at 
Casablanca,  a  port  on  the  Atlantic  between  Rabat 
and  Mazaghan.  France  promptly  sent  cruisers  to 
bombard  Casablanca,  and  landed  three  thousand 

380 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


troops  to  occupy  the  city  on  August  9th. '  Moorish 
attacks  against  this  expeditionary  force  necessitated 
a  vigorous  French  campaign  in  the  hinterland.  At 
the  same  time,  General  Lyautey  was  given  full 
authority  from  Paris  to  use  the  French  forces  in 
Gran  to  repress  the  lawless  Moors  on  the  western 
frontier,  who  were  trying  to  dislodge  the  French 
from  Ujda.    The  French  occupation  had  begim. 

The  complete  anarchy  that  reigned  throughout 
1908  demonstrated  the  hopelessness  of  Morocco 
existing  in  any  other  state  than  as  a  coimtry  from 
which  Europe  was  completely  barred  or  in  which  a 
European  administration  controlled  the  entire  ma- 
chinery of  government,  with  full  political  and  mili- 
tary powers.    Abdul  Aziz  and  Hafid  were  fighting 

'  Much  was  said  and  written  at  the  time  about  the  craelty  of  the 
French  in  the  bombardment  of  Casablanca,  the  occupation  of  the 
city,  and  the  subsequent  campaign.  German  and  English  residents 
of  Casablanca,  who  saw  commercial  disaster  for  themselves  in  the 
French  occupation,  were  assiduous  in  giving  circulation  to  these 
stories,  just  as  four  years  later  the  foreign  residents  of  Tripoli  sent 
out  blood-curdling  stories  of  Itahan  atrocities.  Women  and  child- 
ren certainly  were  killed  in  the  bombardment  and  subsequently. 
The  testimony  I  have  gathered  from  eye-witnesses  is  conflicting, 
as  it  always  is  in  such  cases.  Nothing  is  more  difficult  to  get  at 
than  the  exact  truth  of  atrocities  to  non-combatants  in  a  military 
expedition.  Soldiers  get  out  of  hand.  Much  suffering  is  imavoid- 
ablc.  But  that  the  military  authorities  do  not  try  their  level  best 
to  prevent  excesses  is  improbable.  During  his  march  north  from 
Reggio  to  Naples,  Garabaldi  had  to  order  the  execution  of  some  of 
his  bravest  Red  Shirts.  He  remarked  at  the  time  that  the  officers 
of  invading  armies  were  rarely  responsible  for  the  murder  and  pillage 
and  theft  of  their  troops,  and  that  they  ought  always  to  be  given 
the  benefit  of  the  doubt.  Practically  the  same  thing  was  said  to 
me  by  General  Chaflee,  who  commanded  the  American  army  at 
Tien  Tsin. 

381 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


for  the  sultanate  of  the  Makhzen.  Bu  Hamara 
remained  an  independent  usurper  in  the  Riff.  Rai- 
suH  was  supreme  in  the  neighborhood  of  Tangier. 
France  had  to  fight  hard  to  maintain  the  foothold 
she  had  gained  in  Morocco.  The  Riff  tribes  were 
becoming  a  serious  menate  to  Spain  on  the  Mediter- 
ranean coast.  Abdul  Aziz  and  Hafid  both  appealed 
for  French  aid.  After  Hafid  occupied  Fez  and 
defeated  the  loyal  army  in  August,  Abdul  Aziz  took 
refuge  with  the  French.  Germany  then  came  to  the 
support  of  Hafid. 

The  international — or  rather  Franco-German — 
tension  over  Morocco  was  brought  to  fever  heat 
by  the  Casablanca  incident.  Five  members  of  the 
Foreign  Legion,  three  of  them  Germans,  who  were 
in  the  French  garrison  occupying  Casablanca,  de- 
serted and  took  refuge  in  the  German  Consulate. 
The  three  Germans  demanded  repatriation.  A 
native  escort  was  sent  to  put  them  aboard  a  German 
vessel.  They  were  taken  from  this  consular  escort 
by  force  by  French  gendarmes.  The  German  Con- 
sul's demand  for  their  release  was  refused.  Ger- 
many at  first  asked  that  an  apology  be  made  before 
the  incident  was  referred  to  The  Hague  Tribunal. 
But  international  public  opinion  was  hostile  to  the 
German  side  of  the  case,  and  at  this  moment  Kaiser 
Wilhelm  was  betrayed  into  the  indiscretion  of  the 
much-bruited  Daily  Telegraph  interview.  So  the 
German  Foreign  Office  did  not  feel  strong  enough 
to  insist  upon  the  apology.  A  Solomon's  judgment 
was  gravely  rendered  by  the  Tribunal.  The  Hague 
avoided  carefully  pronouncing  on  the  real  issue, 

382 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 

i.  e.,  whether  France  was  at  home  in  Moroccan 
territory.  The  incident  showed,  however,  that 
public  opinion  was  beginning  to  be  inflamed 
both  in  Germany  and  France  over  the  Morocco 
question. 

In  November,  1908,  Abdul  Aziz,  who,  after  all 
the  years  of  struggle,  was  not  yet  thirty,  agreed  to 
abdicate,  if  he  were  assured  of  his  private  property, 
a  pension  of  thirty-five  thousand  dollars  a  year,  and 
the  right  to  live  at  Tangier.  Hafid  had  now  to  gain 
recognition  as  Sultan  from  the  Powers.  At  the 
end  of  the  year,  he  received  a  communication  from 
all  the  Powers  through  the  French  and  Spanish 
Ministers  stating  that  he  must  assume  the  debts 
of  Abdul  Aziz  and  agree  to  accept  the  provisions  of 
the  Act  of  Algeciras.  Hafid  proved  himself  a  master 
at  bargaining  and  dilatory  tactics.  He  received  a 
French  Mission  in  January,  1909.  While  he  was 
negotiating  with  the  French  he  sent  his  Finance 
Minister  to  raise  a  loan  in  Europe,  and  strengthened 
his  internal  position  by  gaining  a  victory  over  Bu 
Hamara  and  by  winning  Raisuli  through  the  gift 
of  the  governorship  of  the  north.  In  April,  a  British 
Mission  went  to  Fez,  ostensibly  to  present  some  long 
outstanding  British  claims,  but  in  reaHty  to  impress 
on  Hafid  the  necessity  of  agreeing  to  do  what  he 
was  told  by  France. 

Hafid,  however,  continued  to  gain  in  strength  by 
the  disappearance  of  his  rivals.  The  real  Moham- 
med, Hafid's  elder  brother,  conveniently  died  (per- 
haps he  was  poisoned)  at  Fez  in  June.  Bu  Hamara 
was  captured  in  August,  and  taken  to  Fez  in  an 

383 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


iron  cage.'  The  more  Hafid  felt  his  strength,  the 
more  he  was  disinclined  to  allow  the  French  to 
dictate  to  him. 

Hafid  succeeded  in  placating  the  French  tempo- 
rarily and  winning  their  support  by  agreeing  to 
reimburse  France  for  the  expenses  incurred  in  the 
Algerian  frontier  and  Casablanca  expeditions,  and 
to  satisfy  the  claims  of  European  creditors,  the 
majority  of  whom  were  French.  A  host  of  hungry 
crows  flocked  to  Tangier,  and  presented  their  claims 
before  a  commission.  It  is  best  to  draw  the  curtain 
on  this  shameful  business,  in  which  the  European 
Legations  were  involved.  Morocco  was  saddled 
early  in  1910  with  a  debt  of  twenty  million  dollars. 
The  Moors  received  nothing  from  the  loan.  The 
control  of  the  customs  and  harbor  dues,  the  munici- 
pal duties  on  real  estate,  and  the  tobacco  monopoly 
passed  into  European  hands.  The  revenues  were 
to  be  used  to  pay  the  interest  on  the  loan.  There 
was  no  compensation  for  the  natives,  as  elsewhere 
in  Africa,  by  having  the  loan  devoted — in  part,  at 
least — to  railways  and  other  public  works. 

After  the  loan  was  arranged,  Hafid  again  resisted 
the  efforts  of  France  to  take  over  the  administration 

'  He  was  kept  in  the  cage  for  a  long  time,  and  then  thrown  to 
lions.  Before  they  had  mauled  him  to  death,  the  executioner  ar- 
rested him,  and  he  was  formally  shot.  The  custom  of  keeping  a 
prisoner  of  rank  in  a  cage  is  very  old  in  Oriental  countries.  Timur's 
treatment  of  Sultan  Bayczid  is  one  of  the  most  famous  examples. 
See  my  Foundation  of  the  Ottoman  Empire,  pp.  255-256.  Cage 
imprisonment  is  not  unknown,  however,  in  Occidental  history.  At 
Lnches,  near  Tours,  one  can  still  see  the  place  where  Louis  XI.  kept 
Cardinal  de  la  Balue  suspcndccl  in  an  iron  cage. 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


of  Morocco.  A  campaign  was  then  started  in  the 
French  and  British  press.  A  year  before,  he  had 
been  extolled  as  a  wonderful  man,  of  strong  character 
and  promising  future.  Now  he  was  charged  with 
all  sorts  of  unspeakable  cruelties,  of  which  the  putting 
out  of  the  way  of  Mohammed  and  Bu  Hamara  were 
only  two  counts  on  a  long  Hst.  The  Morocco  Times 
correspondent,  who  was  largely  responsible  for 
turning  public  opinion  in  England  against  Hafid, 
after  having  praised  him  at  the  time  of  his  accession, 
told  me  that  Hafid  had  really  changed  in  nature 
during  1909  and  1910.  He  could  not  stand  power, 
and  rapidly  became  worse  than  the  brother  whom 
he  had  succeeded. 

In  the  spring  of  191 1,  many  tribes  rebelled  against 
Hafid.  He  was  besieged  in  Fez.  This  was  the 
moment  for  which  France  had  been  waiting.  Act- 
ing on  the  obhgation  which  her  position  as  "pre- 
dominant power"  imposed  upon  her,  the  French 
forces  at  Casablanca  were  reinforced,  and  two  flying 
columns  sent  to  relieve  Fez.  They  were  followed 
by  a  French  army  of  eight  thousand  under  General 
Moinier,  which  occupied  Fez  on  May  21,  191 1. 
The  independence  of  Morocco  was  over. 

As  far  as  Europe  was  concerned,  France  would 
have  had  an  absolutely  free  hand,  in  spite  of  the 
Conference  of  Algeciras,  had  it  not  been  for  Spain 
and  Germany.  With  these  two  Powers,  France  was 
compelled  to  negotiate. 

The  interest  of  Spain  in  Morocco  dated  back  to 
the  end  of  the  Middle  Ages.  It  was  natural  that 
the  Spaniards  should  feel,  from  the  very  fact  of 
«  385 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


geographical  proximity,  as  much  interest  in  Morocco 
as  the  Power  that  held  Algeria.  Spain  claimed  the 
coast  line  of  the  Mediterranean  from  Alcazar  and 
Ceuta  in  the  Strait  of  Gibraltar  to  the  River  Muluya, 
west  of  the  Ujda  region;  and  as  far  as  El  Arish  on 
the  Atlantic  coast.  Historically,  said  Spain,  the 
whole  of  the  Tetuan  and  Riff  regions  were  hers. 
But  possession  is  the  only  claim  worth  presenting  in 
international  diplomacy.  Nous  y  sommes;  nous  y 
res  tons.  While  France  was  acting  energetically 
on  the  Algerian  frontier  and  on  the  Atlantic  coast, 
Spain  had  been  making  great  sacrifices  to  extend 
her  authority  in  the  hinterland  of  the  Mediterra- 
nean region.  Tangier  was  internationalized,  because 
neither  France  nor  Spain  had  been  able  before  or 
after  the  Conference  of  Algeciras  to  get  the  other 
Powers  to  agree  to  giving  up  their  rights  there. 
While  France  was  negotiating  with  Hafid  in  1909, 
Spain  had  made  a  great  military  effort  against 
the  Riff  tribes  in  the  hinterland  of  Melilla. '  When 

'  At  first  there  were  fifteen  thousand  Spanish  troops  at  Melilla. 
A  call  for  forty  thousand  reinforcements  was  made,  which  was  later 
increased  to  seventy-five  thousand.  The  tribesmen  badly  defeated 
the  Spaniards  on  July  27th.  It  was  necessary  for  Spain  to  make  a 
regular  hill  campaign  against  the  tribes  to  save  her  prestige,  and  to 
turn  Melilla  into  a  fortress.  The  Melilla  campaign  was  the  cause 
of  serious  internal  troubles  in  Spain,  especially  at  Barcelona,  where 
there  was  an  uprising  at  the  end  of  July.  I  was  in  Barcelona  during 
this  uprising,  and  made  a  trip  into  the  portions  of  Catalonia  that 
were  in  the  hands  of  the  rebels.  There  was  universal  complaint 
against  being  sent  to  fight  in  Africa.  Small  wonder!  In  a  few 
months,  Spain  had  more  men  engaged  and  lost  more  killed  and 
wounded  than  France  during  the  whole  period  from  the  landing  at 
Casablanca  until  all  Morocco  was,  six  years  later,  imder  French 
control. 

386 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


Morocco  was  saddled  with  her  debt  the  following 
year,  it  was  agreed  that  Spain  should  receive  twelve 
million  dollars  for  expenses  of  the  Melilla  campaign. 
In  191 1,  when  the  grand  coup  was  being  carried  on 
by  France,  Spain  hurriedly  sent  troops  to  occupy 
1  various  points  in  her  zone,  and  almost  came  to  blows 
i  with  France.  In  fact,  during  the  trying  diplomatic 
period  between  the  occupation  of  Fez  and  the  settle- 
ment of  the  Franco-German  controversy,  France 
would  have  had  serious  trouble  with  Spain,  if  Spain 
had  been  a  strong  Power  Uke  Germany.  But  Spain 
was  weak,  and  had  to  make  the  best  terms  with 
France  that  she  could. 

Hafid  did  his  very  best  to  embroil  France  and 
Spain.  Up  to  the  moment  of  General  Lyautey's 
arrival  as  Resident-General  in  Fez,  he  and  his  coun- 
sellors continued  their  intrigues.  But  Spain, 
although  she  invoked  her  rights  under  the  Hispano- 
Moroccan  Treaty  of  i860  to  claim  several  ports  on 
the  Atlantic  coast,  finally  signed  a  treaty  with  France 
at  Madrid  on  November  27,  19 12,  by  which  she 
was  content  to  receive  the  northeastern  comer  of 
Morocco,  with  the  exclusion  of  Tangier.  Even  this 
portion  she  has  not  been  able  to  organize  as  military 
territory,  much  less  administratively.  The  Moors 
have  been  won  over  to  French  rule,  but  they  still 
refuse  to  acknowledge  Spanish  authority  in  the 
zone  France  agreed  to  leave  to  her  by  the  Treaty 
of  Madrid.  The  international  status  of  Tangier 
has  not  yet  been  settled.  It  militates  greatly  against 
the  interests  of  Tangier,  of  France,  and  of  Morocco 
to  have  the  hinterland  between  Tangier  and  Fez 

387 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


occupied  by  a  Power  that  is  unable  to  master  the 
Tetuan  and  Riff  tribes.  It  is  probable  that  when 
the  world's  territories  are  readjusted  at  the  end  of 
the  present  war,  Spain  will  find  herself  compelled 
to  renounce  the  western  portion,  at  least,  -of  the 
territories  she  secured  by  the  Treaty  of  Madrid. 
In  the  twentieth  century,  the  state  that  cannot  rule 
her  colonies  is  bound  to  lose  them.  The  law  of  the 
survival  of  the  fittest  works  remorselessly. 

The  story  of  how  the  Germans  sent  a  gun-boat 
to  Agadir,  the  port  of  the  Sus  region,  and  held  up 
France  for  compensation,  belongs,  Hke  the  Confer- 
ence of  Algeciras,  to  European  history.  We  have 
not  space  here  to  go  into  the  long  and  involved 
story  of  the  controversy.  On  November  4,  191 1, 
Berlin  and  Paris  came  to  an  agreement.  Two  trea- 
ties were  signed.  The  first,  to  be  presented  to  the 
Powers  who  were  parties  to  the  Act  of  Algeciras, 
recorded  Germany's  consent  to  the  establishment  of 
the  French  Protectorate,  under  condition  that  an 
equality  of  rights  to  all  nations  for  trade,  mining,  and 
railway  concessions,  and  coastal  fishing,  be  guaran- 
teed by  France.  The  second  treaty  gave  Germany 
compensation  by  the  cession  of  two  large  pieces  of 
the  French  Congo  to  her  Kamerun  colony.' 

As  soon  as  France  had  arranged  to  buy  off  Ger- 
man opposition,  she  did  not  wait  longer  to  come  to 
a  definite  understanding  with  Spain,  or  to  hear  from 
the  Powers  who  had  signed  the  Act  of  Algeciras. 
In  fact,  she  could  not  wait.  It  was  a  case  of  going 
into  the  land  to  possess  it  fully,  or  leaving  in  extreme 

'  See  above,  pp.  306,  339. 

388 


FRANCE  GETS  MOROCCO 


peril  her  own  forces  and  Europeans  resident  in 
Morocco.  The  situation  required  energy  and  mili- 
tary and  diplomatic  ability  of  a  high  order.  On 
March  30,  1912,  Sxiltan  Hafid  bowed  to  the  inevi- 
table, and  signed  the  treaty  placing  Morocco  under 
French  protection.  Less  than  three  weeks  later, 
Moorish  troops  in  Fez  mutinied.  They  massacred 
seventeen  French  officers  and  nine  French  civiUans. 
Europeans  other  than  French  were  not  molested. 
Four  thousand  troops  were  hurried  to  Fez  by  forced 
marches.  On  May  26,  General  Lyautey  entered 
Fez  to  take  supreme  command  of  Morocco.  There 
were  nearly  forty  thousand  French  troops  in  the 
country. 

General  Lyautey  showed  immediately  a  genius 
for  doing  the  right  thing  that  one  is  led  by  African 
colonial  history  to  expect  only  of  an  Anglo-Saxon. 
General  Moinier  had  fined  Fez  a  million  francs  in 
punishment  for  the  uprising.  General  Lyautey 
withdrew  the  edict.  He  put  his  finger  immediately 
upon  an  injustice  that  was  the  principal  cause  of 
native  hostility,  just  as  it  had  been  in  Algeria, — 
the  alienation  of  lands  to  French  subjects  and  to 
natives  who  had  been  manifestly  working  for  French 
political  interests.  He  let  it  be  known  that  France 
intended  to  do  the  square  thing  in  every  particular. 
There  would  be  no  injustice,  no  cruelty,  no  exploita- 
tion by  the  adventurers  who  followed  the  army. 

For  five  months,  General  Lyautey  had  his  hands 
full  in  pacifying  the  country.  He  deposed  Hafid, 
whom  the  French  had  never  been  able  to  trust,  and 
put  on  the  throne  Yusef,  the  third  son  of  Hassan 

389 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  become  Sultan.  There  was  a  pretender,  who  had 
captured  Marakesh,  to  put  down.  In  November, 
1 9 12,  General  Lyautey  reported  the  pacification  of 
Morocco,  and  asked  for  a  loan  of  sixty  million  dol- 
lars to  build  railways  and  roads.  During  the  first 
half  of  1 9 13,  General  Lyautey  discovered  that  there 
was  still  much  important  military  work  to  be  ac- 
complished. But  just  a  year  before  the  beginning 
of  the  European  War,  the  French  were  able  at  last 
to  devote  all  their  energies  to  administrative  or- 
ganization and  to  economic  development.  It  is  a 
splendid  tribute  to  General  Lyautey  that  he  was 
able  to  send  a  large  part  of  his  army  to  France  in 
August,  1914,  including  contingents  recruited  from 
tribes  that  had  been  his  bitter  enemies  eighteen 
months  before. 

Aside  from  two  small  military  lines,  there  are  as 
yet  no  railways  in  Morocco.  The  European  War 
arrived  too  soon  after  the  pacification  to  make 
possible  a  definite  statement  of  how  Morocco  is 
thriving  economically  under  French  control.  But 
the  beginning  is  encouraging  in  every  way,  and  is 
most  flattering  to  the  French  authorities  who  have 
to  cope  with  an  international  situation  that  presents 
many  tinsettled  problems. 


390 


CHAPTER  XX 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  OF  THE 
KHEDIVES 

■^HE  most  fascinating  and  best  known  portion  of 


Africa,  from  the  earliest  days  of  history  to 


the  present  time,  is  Egypt.  The  valley  of 
the  Nile  plays  no  less  important  a  part  in  world 
history  to-day  than  twenty  centuries  ago  or  forty 
centuries  ago  or  sixty  centuries  ago.  More  Ameri- 
cans go  to  Egypt  than  to  other  Mediterranean 
countries,  with  the  exception  of  Italy.  But  no  more 
in  Egypt  than  in  Italy  are  they  interested  in  a  con- 
temporary history.  A  guide  (if  I  used  the  adjective 
insistent  I  would  be  guilty  of  redundancy!)  came  to 
me  at  Luxor  last  winter  with  an  alluring  project 
of  a  week's  journey  to  ancient  monuments.  There 
were  twelve  items,  I  think.  I  crossed  out  all  except 
the  first,  a  moonlight  donkey  ride  to  Kamak.  "I 
am  here  only  for  this  evening,"  I  explained.  "To- 
morrow I  must  leave  at  six  in  the  morning  for  Assiut." 
"But  you  have  just  arrived, "  he  remonstrated,  "and 
no  one  goes  to  Assiut  anyway."  He  did  not  under- 
stand when  I  told  him  that  there  was  too  much  history 
being  made  in  1916  a.d.  to  waste  time  on  1916  B.C. 
"You  cannot  be  an  American,"  he  said,  shaking  his 


391 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


head  in  disappointment  and  disapproval.  Thou- 
sands of  Americans  who  have  visited  Egypt  since 
the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century  know  only 
one  event  of  its  modern  history,  the  building  of  the 
Assuan  Dam,  and  that  because  it  was  an  "act  of 
vandalism"  that  partly  covered  the  Temple  of 
Pylag.  And  yet,  Egypt  under  the  Pharaohs  and 
Ptolemies  is  not  as  interesting  as  Egypt  under  the 
Khedives.  The  pyramids  are  not  as  monumental 
as  the  Suez  Canal,  and  the  ruins  of  Luxor  as  impres- 
sive as  the  realities  of  Assuan.  Many  and  glorious 
are  the  pages  in  Britain's  Empire  overseas,  but  none 
so  wonderful  as  the  Egyptian  page.  In  Egypt  one 
realizes  that  the  inheritance  of  the  Roman  Empire 
has  not  fallen  on  the  Osmanlis  through  Constanti- 
nople, but  on  the  English  through  York. 

Throughout  the  middle  period  of  the  nineteenth 
century,  British  foreign  policy  was  built  upon  the 
maintenance  of  the  Ottoman  Empire.  The  Ottoman 
Empire  lay  between  Europe  and  Asia.  The  Sultan 
of  Turkey  was  the  Khalif  of  the  Mohammedan  world. 
Russia  was  making  great  progress  in  Central  Asia. 
This  brought  her  to  the  northern  and  western  con- 
fines of  India,  and  extended  her  sovereignty  over 
Mohammedan  nations.  If  Russia  became  the  mas- 
ter of  Turkey,  not  only  would  she  have  access  to 
the  Mediterranean,  but  also  she  would  control  the 
destinies  of  Islam.  The  preservation  of  Britain's 
position  in  India  and  as  predominant  Power  in  the 
Mohammedan  world  depended  upon  checking  Russia. 
British  statesmen  believed  that  the  political  in- 
dependence and  the  territorial  integrity  of  the 

392 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


Ottoman  Empire  were  essential  to  the  British 
Empire  overseas.  The  Crimean  War  was  fought 
on  this  belief,  and  Russia  was  menaced  with  another 
war  in  1877  in  pursuance  of  the  same  policy.  The 
Treaty  of  Berlin,  which  superseded  the  Treaty  of 
San  Stefano,  was  the  work  of  British  statesmen, 
who  did  not  hesitate  to  sacrifice  the  Christian  nations 
of  the  Balkans  and  the  Christians  under  the  Turkish 
yoke  for  the  sake  of  British  interests  in  India.  This 
policy  was  abandoned  because  Egypt  made  no 
longer  necessary  its  maintenance. 

When  the  Suez  Canal  was  projected,  and  even 
while  it  was  being  built,  the  British  opposed  it. 
The  French  were  doing  it,  and  French  influence  in 
Egypt  seemed  as  much  a  possible  menace  to  India 
as  Russian  influence  in  Turkey.  The  year  after  the 
Canal  was  completed,  Germany  crushed  France. 
From  that  moment,  it  was  possible  for  Great  Britain 
to  get  control  of  the  Canal.  To  make  secure  the 
control  of  the  Canal,  Britain  must  have  the  predomi- 
nant position  in  Egypt.  France  would  have  to  get 
out.  I  am  stating  the  facts  baldly.  There  was  no 
deep-laid  plot  on  the  part  of  British  statesmen  to 
reap  where  they  had  not  sown.  Nations  like  in- 
dividuals are  moved  by  irresistible  forces.  The 
Canal  was  cut.  Steam-driven  ships  had  displaced 
sail-driven  ships.  India  and  other  important  parts 
of  Asia  were  already  in  British  hands.  In  Australasia 
a  new  Anglo-Saxon  world  was  in  the  process  of 
development.  Great  Britain  had  to  control  the 
path  from  east  to  west,  which  was  far  more  important 
to  her  than  to  any  other  nation  of  Europe. 

393  ' 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  British  entered  Egypt  in  1882  in  a  legitimate 
way.  An  anti-European  movement  threatened  the 
lives  and  property  of  Europeans,  and  the  safety  of 
the  Canal,  which  had  become  an  essential  inter- 
national waterway.  The  Khedive  was  powerless 
to  restore  order.  Turkey,  the  suzerain  state,  could 
do  nothing.  France,  invited  to  cooperate,  refused 
to  intervene.  The  British  fleet  and  a  small  British 
army  occupied  Alexandria,  Cairo,  and  the  Canal, 
and  restored  the  authority  of  the  Khedive.  An 
attempt  was  made  immediately  by  British  diplomacy 
to  regularize  the  new  situation.  London  announced 
that  the  army  of  occupation  would  be  withdrawn 
when  order  was  restored. 

No  student,  who  has  gone  into  the  history  of  the 
decade  that  followed,  can  find  reason  to  question 
the  good  faith  and  sincerity  of  the  British  Govern- 
ment. A  mistake  was  made  in  not  asking  consent  of 
the  Powers  and  Turkey  to  the  proclamation  of  a 
British  Protectorate.  But  it  was  a  mistake  that 
demonstrates  the  honesty  of  purpose,  if  not  the 
statesmanship,  of  those  who  directed  the  Foreign 
Office  through  a  very  trying  period.  It  would  have 
been  a  calamity  for  Egypt  as  well  as  for  the  world 
had  the  British  withdrawn.  The  Egyptians  could 
not  work  out  their  own  salvation.  Turkey  was  in- 
capable of  taking  back  the  country  she  had  lost 
through  her  incapacity  to  govern.  The  Powers 
were  unwilling  to  assume  conjointly  the  responsibility 
of  governing  Egypt  or  of  internationalizing  the  Canal. 
So  the  British  authorities,  supported  by  a  garrison  in 
Cairo,  simply  stayed  on.  There  was  nothing  else  to  do. 

394 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century,  the 
British  had  been  eighteen  years  in  Egypt.  From  an 
international  point  of  view,  the  situation  was  just 
as  it  was  in  the  beginning — and  it  remained  so  until 
Turkey's  entrance  into  the  present  war  led  to  the 
establishment  of  a  British  Protectorate. 

Nominally,  Egypt  was  an  autonomous  vilayet 
(province)  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  ruled  by  a  khe- 
dive  (viceroy).  The  relations  between  Turkey  and 
Egypt  had  been  arranged  by  agreements  between 
sultans  and  khedives.  The  khedives  acknowledged 
the  suzerainty  of  the  sultans,  and  paid  an  annual 
tribute.  After  Ismail,  succession  in  the  khedivate 
was  from  father  to  son  and  not  (as  should  be  the 
practice  in  an  Islamic  country)  to  the  oldest  living 
member  of  the  house  of  Mohammed  Ali.  The 
Turkish  flag  was  used  in  Egypt,  and  the  spiritual 
overlordship  of  Constantinople  acknowledged  by 
Cairo.  The  relations  between  Egypt  and  other 
nations  had  been  established  by  treaties  with  Turkey. 
Europeans  and  Americans  enjoyed  the  privileges  of 
a  capitulatory  regime  as  in  Turkey.  Their  interests 
were  looked  after  by  consuls-general  in  Cairo, 
exercising  diplomatic  functions,  and  consuls  and 
consvilar  agents  in  other  cities.  Justice  was  ad- 
ministered in  consular  courts  and  in  mixed  tribunals 
of  European  and  Egyptian  judges.  The  Egyptian 
debt  was  under  international  control,  with  repre- 
sentatives of  the  Powers  supervising  the  expenditure 
of  revenues  affected  to  pay  the  interest  on  the  debt. 
All  nations  had  the  same  privileges  in  regard  to 
customs  and  doing  business  in  the  coimtry.  The 

395 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Government  of  the  Khedive  was  exercised  by  a 
ministry,  with  a  premier,  as  in  European  states,  but, 
as  in  Oriental  states,  the  Khedive  kept  legislative 
authority  in  his  own  hands.  His  national  council 
and  national  assembly  were  advisory  bodies,  possess- 
ing only  such  authority  as  the  Kliedive  was  willing 
for  them  to  enjoy. 

Practically,  Egypt  was  quit  of  Turkish  control 
with  the  tribute  and  the  flag.  The  ruler  of  the 
country  was  the  British  Consul-General,  who  ruled 
through  advisers  in  the  different  ministries.  For 
the  sake  of  form,  the  diplomatic  agents  of  other 
countries  looked  upon  the  Khedive  as  ruler  of  Egypt, 
and  carried  on  negotiations  with  the  Khedive's 
ministry.  In  fact,  all  matters  were  decided  at  the 
British  Agency.  The  Khedive  was  a  figurehead: 
and  his  ministers  were  figureheads.  Britain  ruled 
with  the  hand  of  a  master.  The  final  authority  was 
the  British  Cabinet,  to  whom  the  Consul-General 
made  an  annual  report. 

Great  Britain's  position  in  Egypt  was  maintained 
by  a  garrison  in  the  Cairo  citadel,  and  by  control  of 
the  Egyptian  army  through  British  officers,  who 
held  the  principal  commands. 

This  situation  was  possible  only  through  the  im- 
potence of  Turkey,  the  acquiescence  of  the  Powers, 
and  the  willingness  of  the  Egyptians  to  live  under 
British  authority.  In  order  to  stay  in  Egypt,  it 
was  necessary  for  the  British  officials  to  keep  Turkey 
and  the  Powers  from  interfering,  and  to  prevent  a 
movement  in  Egypt  on  the  part  of  the  Khedive  and 
the  educated  Egyptians  to  take  back  into  their  own 

396 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


hands  the  control  of  the  country.  From  the  very 
beginning,  it  was  realized  that  this  could  not  be 
accomplished  through  force — save  as  regarded  Tur- 
key. The  Powers  would  accept  the  de  facto  regime  in 
Egypt  only  if  the  British  succeeded  in  making  the 
country  prosper,  so  that  the  interest  on  the  debt 
could  be  paid,  and  in  affording  security  and  equal 
opportunity  to  all  Europeans  to  reside  and  to  do 
business  in  the  country.  As  far  as  the  Egyptians 
were  concerned,  the  task  of  Great  Britain  was  to  give 
them  good  government  and  prosperity. 

The  British  were  able  to  stay  in  Egypt  during  the 
last  two  decades  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and  to 
make  the  Egyptians  and  the  world  in  general  accept 
the  status  quo,  all  the  while  strengthening  their 
position,  not  because  of  the  garrison  in  the  Cairo 
citadel,  but  because  of  the  ability  to  send  to  Egypt, 
for  the  civil  administration  and  for  the  army,  men 
whose  genius  was  matched  only  by  their  devotion. 
British  officers  built  up  anew  the  Egyptian  army. 
British  engineers  solved  the  problem  of  irriga- 
tion. British  administrators  attacked  successfully 
the  political,  social,  and  economic  problems  of  bring- 
ing peace  and  prosperity  and  contentment  out  of  an- 
archy and  poverty  and  oppression.  The  supervising 
agency  of  this  remarkable  achievement  was  the 
British  Consul-General,  Sir  Evelyn  Baring,  after- 
wards Lord  Cromer. 

There  is  no  need  here  to  go  into  the  economic 
history  of  Egypt  under  British  control.  Twenty 
years  after  the  British  entered  Egypt,  Lord  Cromer 
was  able  to  write  that  the  institution  of  slavery 

397 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 

was  virtually  defunct;  the  corvee  (forced  labor) 
practically  abolished;  the  courhash  (whip)  no  longer 
employed  as  an  instrument  of  government ;  the  army 
efficient  and  well-organized,  and  the  abuses  tmder 
the  old  recruiting  system  swept  away;  new  prisons 
and  reformatories  built  and  the  treatment  of  pris- 
oners in  conformity  with  principles  generally  adopted 
in  Europe ;  the  sick  nursed  in  well-equipped  and  well- 
managed  hospitals;  lunatics  no  longer  treated  like 
wild  beasts;  means  provided  for  allowing  peasants 
to  free  themselves  from  the  grip  of  money-lenders; 
a  very  great  impulse  given  to  education  in  all  its 
branches;  the  Assuan  Dam  opened,  which  would 
provide  one-third  of  the  agriculttu-al  area  of  Upper 
Egypt  with  perennial  irrigation;  modem  railways 
running  from  one  end  of  the  country-  to  the  other; 
more  than  one  hundred  million  dollars  spent  on 
railways  and  other  public  works,  all  saved  out  of 
the  resources  of  Egypt,  without  recourse  to  foreign 
capital  or  increase  of  the  public  debt;  cotton-raising 
developed  so  as  to  make  Egypt  one  of  the  first  pro- 
ducers of  the  world;  Alexandria  and  Cairo  trans- 
formed into  great  European  cities;  Alexandria  and 
Port  Said  developed  into  ports  and  coaling  stations 
of  mondial  importance;  and  the  Suez  Canal  made 
secure  as  the  waterway  of  four  continents.  The 
Egyptian  Treasury  contained  an  accumulated  sur- 
plus of  thirty  million  dollars,  which  was  increasing 
annually  by  nearly  three  million  dollars.  When 
one  contrasts  the  economic  and  financial  history  of 
the  mother  country,  Turkey,  during  the  same  period, 
and  social  conditions  in  Egypt  and  other  Islamic 

398 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


countries,  the  benefit  of  British  rule  cannot  be 
contested. 

But  the  whole  story  of  Egypt  in  the  twentieth 
century  impresses  us  with  the  truth  of  the  fact  that 
man  liveth  not  by  bread  alone.  No  nation  is  con- 
tented with  material  blessings.  Nations,  like  in- 
dividuals, are  in  an  unhealthy  state  when  they  have 
not  developed  by  their  own  efforts,  and  are  pro- 
foundly unhappy  when  they  are  not  managing  their 
own  affairs.  It  is  vain  to  try  to  persuade  them  that 
they  are  better  off  under  guardianship  of  another 
nation  stronger  and  more  intelligent  and  more  capable 
than  themselves.  There  is  no  more  profound  truth 
in  the  history  of  human  relationships  than  that 
the  benefactor  is  as  much  hated  as  the  taskmaster. 
Only  when  gifts  are  solicited  and  appreciated — and 
not  always  then — is  the  giver  liked.  It  is  rare  that 
charity  helps  any  one.  Assistance  ought  to  be  on 
the  quid  pro  quo  basis.  Above  all  things  in  the  world 
it  is  impossible  to  help  a  man  upwards  morally  when 
you  consider  yourself  his  superior,  and  he  knows  that 
you  consider  yourself  his  superior.  I  suppose  this 
will  be  considered  rank  heresy  by  many  of  my  readers. 
But  it  explains  the  history  of  Egypt  in  the  last 
fifteen  years.  Instead  of  marveling  at  the  ingrati- 
tude and  blindness  and  shortsightedness  of  the 
Egyptians,  and  denouncing  the  folly  of  their  aspira- 
tions, it  is  best  to  realize  that  their  sentiments  are 
probably  just  what  ours  would  be  if  we  were  in  their 
place. 

Abbas  Hilmi  came  to  the  throne,  upon  the  death 
of  his  father,  Tewfik,  in  1892,  when  he  was  a  boy  of 

399 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


eighteen.  From  the  very  beginning  of  his  reign, 
it  was  impressed  upon  him  by  Lord  Cromer,  Colonel 
Kitchener,  and  other  British  officials  with  whom  he 
came  in  contact,  that  he  must  realize  which  side  his 
bread  was  buttered  on.  He  was  given  all  the  show 
of  power  with  none  of  the  reality,  and  whenever  he 
seemed  disposed  to  have  an  opinion  contrary  to  that 
of  London  or  the  British  Agency,  Lord  Cromer 
talked  to  him  like  a  Dutch  Uncle.  He  made  the 
best  of  it:  because  he  had  to.  But  one  can  hardly 
blame  him  for  not  appreciating  his  benefits  as  much 
as  his  benefactors  did,  especially  as  it  was  constantly 
in  his  mind  that,  although  they  were  doing  the 
handsome  thing  by  Egypt,  they  were  inspired,  not 
by  love  for  Egypt,  but  by  the  fact  that  Great  Britain 
must  stay  in  Egypt  in  order  to  keep  control  of  the 
Suez  Canal.  The  thought  must  often  have  occurred 
to  him  that  the  British  had  no  real  right,  except  that 
of  superior  force,  to  rule  the  country  which  his  ances- 
tors had  wrested  from  the  Turks  and  into  which  the 
khedives  had  tried  to  introduce  modern  civiHzation 
long  before  Lord  Cromer  came.  I  take  Abbas 
Hilmi  here  as  the  illustration  of  the  general  attitude 
of  well-born  and  educated  Egyptians,  whether  they 
are  of  Arabic,  Turkish,  Coptic,  Syrian,  or  Armenian 
origin. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  twentieth  century,  in 
Moslem  lands  education  in  missionary  colleges  and 
in  European  and  American  universities,  and  general 
contact  with  Occidental  civilization,  inspired  the 
younger  generation  with  the  desire  to  establish  a 
democratic  and  representative  form  of  government. 

400 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE^ 


The  movement  was,  of  course,  primarily  directed 
against  the  despotism  of  Oriental  systems  of  govern- 
ment. Had  it  not  been  for  the  fact  that  in  some 
Moslem  coimtries,  such  as  Egypt  and  India,  Euro- 
peans were  already  in  control,  and  in  others,  such  as 
Persia  and  Turkey,  were  endeavoring  to  gain  control, 
this  movement  would  have  been  purely  poHtical, 
and  would  not  have  affected  international  European 
politics.  Partly  for  this  reason  and  partly  for  the 
reason  that  the  smartest  and  most  advanced  and 
best  educated  elements  within  the  Moslem  countries 
were  the  Christian  minority,  the  Young  Turk,  Young 
Persian,  Young  Indian,  and  Young  Egyptian  move- 
ments very  quickly  took  on  an  unfortunate  religious 
character.  So  the  democratic  ideal  became  hope- 
lessly diverted.  It  was  the  mixing  of  oil  and  water. 
Islam  is  an  admirable  social  democracy  within  the 
Moslem  world.  But  it  does  not  grant  equahty 
before  the  law  to  non-Moslems,  and  it  is  irrecon- 
ciliable  in  theory  and  practice  with  the  modern  state, 
endowed  with  representative  institutions,  that  has 
been  evolved  by  Christian  civilization.  The  Young 
Moslems  wanted  Christian  Occidental  institutions, 
without  their  foundation  and  without  their  spirit. 
The  result  was  anti-European  and  anti-Christian 
propaganda  that  would  have  brought  either  anarchy 
or  oligarchy,  had  the  Young  Moslems  succeeded 
in  carrying  out  their  program.  Their  partial  suc- 
cess in  Persia  and  in  Turkey  did,  in  fact,  bring 
anarchy  in  Pensia  and  oligarchy  in  Turkey.  Egypt 
and  India  were  saved  by  the  strong  hand  of  their 
British  master. 

26  401 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Coupled  with  the  Young  Moslem  movement  was 
the  pan-Islamic  movement,  launched  by  the  Old 
Moslems.  It,  also,  was  anti-European  and  anti- 
Christian.  It  has  failed  just  as  the  Young  Moslem 
movement  has  failed,  because  the  spirit  of  soHdarity 
is  lacking  in  Islam,  and  because  the  great  mass  of 
the  followers  of  Mohammed  are  so  ignorant  that  they 
cannot  grasp  the  possibilities  and  the  advantages  of 
political  union.  Moslem  countries  will  have  neither 
national  nor  international  awakening  until  they  have 
passed  through  the  stage  of  popular  education  and 
until  they  have  produced  their  Montesquieus,  their 
Lockes,  their  Adam  Smiths,  their  Diderots,  their 
Voltaires,  their  Rousseaus,  their  John  Stuart  Mills, 
and  their  Herbert  Spencers.  Their  great  Revolution 
will  come  only  after  they  are  capable  of  a  Tugendhund. 

Egypt,  the  connecting  link  between  Moslem  Asia 
and  Moslem  Africa,  the  home  of  enlightened  Young 
Moslems  and  of  the  most  fanatical  element  of  Islam, 
refuge  and  pasture-ground  of  the  most  Tory  of 
Turkish  pashas,  vital  milestone  on  Britain's  path  to 
India,  neighbor  of  Arabia  and  the  Holy  Cities,  was 
the  maelstrom  of  Islamic  agitation  during  the  first 
decade  of  the  twentieth  century.  What  the  British 
had  to  face  in  Egypt  and  how  they  faced  it  is  an 
all-important  page  in  contemporary  history.  Three 
Consuls-General,  Lord  Cromer,  Sir  Eldon  Gorst,  and 
Lord  Kitchener  played  a  larger  part  in  the  history 
of  the  world  than  they  were  aware  of  when  they  were 
dealing  with  the  Egyptian  Nationalist  movement. 

Mustafa  Kamel  built  his  Nationalist  propaganda 
upon  the  hope  of  French  intervention  in  Egypt. 

402 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 

He  imbibed  his  democratic  notions  and  conceived 
the  idea  of  a  free  Egj'pt  in  Paris.  He  was  "taken 
up"  in  certain  circles  and  frequented  certain  salons 
where  the  principal  topic  of  conversation  was  how 
the  French  hated  the  English.  This  was  the  year  of 
Fashoda.  When  I  first  knew  of  Mustafa  Kamel, 
he  was  being  flattered  and  filled  ftdl  of  ideas  by 
several  influential  Frenchmen  and  one  celebrated 
Frenchwoman  (it  is  not  necessary  to  mention  their 
names  now,  for  they  have  since  become  as  intensely 
Anglophile  as  they  were  then  Anglophobe).  Mus- 
tafa Kamel  was  very  hmited  intellectually.  But  his 
French  friends  saw  in  him  the  best  sort  of  a  fire- 
brand to  throw  into  Egypt  in  revenge  for  the  attitude 
of  Lord  Cromer  and  Lord  Kitchener  at  Fashoda. 
For  Mustafa  Kamel  had  enthusiasm  and  magnetism 
and  the  gift  of  public  speaking — just  the  qualities  of 
the  demagogue.  He  could  be  inspired  and  con- 
trolled by  French  journalists  working  discreetly 
behind  the  scenes. 

At  the  end  of  1899,  Mustafa  Kamel  returned  to 
Cairo  from  Paris,  and  gathered  around  him  by  his 
brilHant,  though  superficial  eloquence,  the  educated 
young  men  of  Egypt.  He  would  not  have  had  the 
ghost  of  a  chance  to  succeed  among  intellectual  and 
thoughtful  people,  had  it  not  been  that  they  were 
continually  smarting  from  the  fact  that  the  British 
in  Egypt,  residents  as  well  as  officials,  treated  them 
as  social  inferiors.  In  order  to  extend  his  propa- 
ganda to  the  fellahin,  he  founded  the  Arabic  news- 
paper Lewa.  Its  success  was  phenomenal.  Within 
a  year,  Lcwa  became  the  most  influential  newspaper 

403 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


in  Egypt.  The  fellahin  could  not  read,  but  the 
local  Moslem  clergy  gathered  the  villagers  around 
them,  and  read  to  them  of  the  new  glory  that  would 
come  to  Islam  when  the  English  were  expelled. 

At  the  very  beginning,  the  Nationalist  movement 
dug  its  own  grave.  JMustafa  Kamel  and  his  associ- 
ates thought  that  giving  their  propaganda  a  religious 
character  was  the  essential  factor  of  success;  but  in 
doing  this,  they  defeated  the  very  end  they  thought 
they  were  advancing.  Although  Mustafa  Kamel 
considered  himself  almost  a  Frenchman  and  looked 
to  France  for  support,  he  was  too  stupid  to  see  that 
his  agitation  was  directed  against  the  interests  of  those 
on  whose  cooperation  he  was  banking.  The  Egyp- 
tian Nationalist  movement  was  launched  by  French- 
men to  make  trouble  for  the  British.  It  paved  the 
way  for  the  Anglo-French  entente!  Mustafa  Kamel' s 
speeches  and  writings  in  Egypt,  and  the  Young 
Egyptian  congresses  in  Switzerland,  caused  alarm 
among  far-seeing  French  statesmen,  who  saw  in 
pan-Islamism  a  menace  to  their  own  interests  fully 
equal  to  the  menace  to  British  interests.  From 
the  moment  of  its  birth,  the  Egyptian  Nationalist 
movement  was  a  boomerang  to  the  French.  The 
most  bitter  Anglophobes  began  to  feel  the  necessity 
of  an  understanding  with  Great  Britain.  There  was 
the  same  reaction  in  Russia. 

Nothing  in  contemporary  history  is  more  fascinat- 
ing than  the  study  of  the  change  in  Anglo-French 
relations  between  1898  and  1904.  The  student  is 
convinced  of  four  things:  that  common  interests 
rather  than  common  ideals  bring  nations  together 

404 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDR^ 


into  political  alliances;  that  these  common  interests 
are  decided  by  a  few  men,  who  are  able,  even  in 
democracies,  to  lead  their  nations  along  paths  that 
the  people  at  large  are  wholly  ignorant  they  are 
following;  that  the  success  of  these  few  men  in 
winning  and  keeping  the  power  to  decide  the  des- 
tinies of  their  fellow-countrymen  is  assured  by  the 
cooperation  of  press  agencies  and  newspapers;  and 
that  the  appeal  to  national  honor  and  patriotism  is 
in  reality  an  appeal  to  the  two  basic  passions  of 
mankind,  pride  and  pocket-book.  When  the  storm 
breaks,  and  the  nation  finds  itself  in  danger,  there  can 
be  no  doubt  that  the  men  who  go  to  war  are  imbued 
with  the  highest  and  noblest  qualities,  and  give  their 
lives  gladly  in  defense  of  their  homes  and  their  loved 
ones.  God  forbid  that  the  shghtest  aspersion  be 
cast  upon  the  motives  leading  heroic  soldiers  to  suffer 
and  endure  and  die  for  their  country.  But  in  follow- 
ing the  gathering  of  the  storm  clouds,  before  they 
break,  one  sees  clearly  the  iniquity  of  secret  diplo- 
macy. We  are  in  hell  now,  and  have  to  get  out  of  it 
the  best  way  we  can.  But  if  students  and  writers 
are  honestly  and  courageously  devoted  to  their  high 
calling,  they  will  do  all  in  their  power  to  enHghten 
public  opinion,  in  the  hope  that  the  next  generation, 
by  taking  into  its  own  hands  the  decision  of  national 
policies  and  national  destinies,  will  avoid  another 
descent  into  hell. 

The  Anglo-French  Agreement  of  1904  was  a  death- 
blow to  the  Egyptian  Nationalist  movement  and  to 
the  success  of  pan-Islamism,  which  depended  upon 
the  rivalry  of  the  two  European  Powers  who  had  most 

405 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  do  with  Islam.  It  came  just  in  time.  France 
needed  a  free  hand  in  Morocco  and  West  Africa 
and  the  Sudan.  Great  Britain  needed  to  be  re- 
lieved of  French  opposition  in  Egypt.  Not  only 
were  the  Nationalists  gaining  in  strength,  but 
Turkey  was  beginning  to  interfere  with  the  British 
occupation. 

The  extension  of  the  Ottoman  railway  from  Damas- 
cus to  Medina  and  Mecca  brought  Great  Britain  and 
Turkey  into  conflict  over  the  question  of  the  control 
of  the  Sinai  Peninsula.  To  anticipate  the  Turks, 
Lord  Cromer  sent  Egyptian  troops  to  occupy  posts 
on  the  west  side  of  the  Gulf  of  Akaba.  They  found 
the  Turkish  flag  flying  there.  The  Turks  demanded 
a  boundary  line  which  would  have  brought  them  to 
the  eastern  bank  of  the  Suez  Canal.  The  British 
Ambassador  at  Constantinople  was  instructed  to 
demand  the  withdrawal  of  Turkish  garrisons  from  the 
peninsula,  and  to  insist  upon  the  right  of  Egypt, 
under  the  Sultan's  firman  of  1892,  to  administer 
the  peninsula.  The  British  claim  really  rested  on  a 
telegram  of  Lord  Cromer,  appended  at  the  time  to 
the  firman,  to  which  the  Ottoman  Government  had 
then  "raised  no  objection."  Turkey  had  to  give  in, 
and  the  safety  of  the  Canal  was  assured.  It  was  at 
this  same  time  that  the  Turks  were  active  in  the 
hinterland  of  Tripoli,  and  France  was  having  a 
similar  discussion  with  the  Sublime  Porte  over  the 
Turkish  garrisons  the  French  had  found  in  the 
Sahara  on  the  route  to  Lake  Chad.  The  benefit  of 
the  Agreement  of  1904  began  to  be  evident  to  many 
Frenchmen  who  had  not  up  to  this  time  become 

406 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


reconciled  to  it.  This  was  the  period,  also,  of  the 
Conference  of  Algeciras. 

The  discussion  with  Turkey  brought  about  much 
unrest  in  Egypt,  where  the  Nationalists  were  in  open 
sympathy  with  Turkey's  side  of  the  case.  A  British 
soldier  was  beaten  in  the  streets  of  Cairo,  and  on 
June  13,  1906,  the  villagers  of  Denshawai  assaulted 
five  British  officers  who  were  shooting  pigeons. 
One  of  them  was  killed,  and  two  others  seriously 
injured.  The  natives  were  arrested  and  tried  by  a 
special  tribunal.  Four  were  hanged,  two  sent  to 
prison  for  life,  ten  for  shorter  terms,  and  eight  were 
flogged.  As  there  was  no  doubt  that  the  villagers 
acted  under  great  provocation,  and  had  not  at- 
tacked the  officers  with  intention  to  kiU,  the  severity 
of  the  sentence  caused  a  great  outcry  in  England, 
and  had  a  very  bad  effect  in  Egypt.'  It  gave  to 
the  Nationalist  party  support  among  the  fcllahin 
that  had  been  lacking  before. 

In  the  midst  of  the  Nationalist  turmoil.  Lord 

'  I  first  visited  Egypt  three  years  later,  when  the  Nationalists  were 
in  close  connection  with  the  Young  Turks.  I  found  the  Denshawai 
executions  invariably  called  "the  massacre  "  by  the  Young  Egyptians. 
After  a  lapse  of  six  more  years,  during  my  ^isit  of  19 16,  "the  mas- 
sacre" was  still  vivid  in  the  minds  of  many  to  whom  I  talked.  They 
spoke  of  it  as  the  unforgettable  and  unforgivable  crime  that  had 
revealed  to  them  the  bitterness  and  injustice  of  their  slavery.  More 
than  one  Egyptian  drew  the  parallel  between  the  British  miUtary 
caste  and  the  Prussian  military  caste,  and  said  that  the  officers  who 
were  shooting  pigeons  against  the  protest  of  tlie  villagers  richly 
deserved  the  beating  they  got.  There  was  no  evidence  whatever  that 
the  villagers  intended  to  kill  them.  The  provocation  must  have  been 
very  great:  for  the  fellahin  are  peacefully  inclined,  and  have  very 
little  courage. 

407 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 

Cromer  resigned  after  twenty-five  years  of  service. 
We  have  already  spoken  of  the  wonderful  work  he 
accomplished  in  the  economic  and  social  regeneration 
of  Egypt.  I  have  not  thought  it  necessary  to  go  into 
this  side  of  Egyptian  contemporary  history.  The 
literature  on  the  subject  is  voluminous,  and  accessible 
to  English-speaking  readers  everywhere.  Lord  Cro- 
mer himself  has  written  in  detail  the  history  of  his 
quarter  century  in  Egypt.'  From  a  material  point 
of  view,  it  is  the  record  of  a  miraculous  achievement. 
But  the  Egyptians  never  forgot  that  Lord  Cromer 
was  a  British  official,  ruling  them  against  their  will, 
and  always  putting  British  interests  before  Egyptian 
interests.  A  most  intelligent  Egyptian,  who  is  a 
believer  in  a  limited  British  control  of  Egypt,  an 
admirer  of  British  methods  and  British  results, 
and  an  influential  supporter  of  the  present  British 
Protectorate,  said  to  me  recently :  ' '  During  the  first 
fifteen  years  of  the  British  occupation.  Lord  Cromer 
was  the  right  man  in  the  right  place.  We  needed 
just  his  type.  But  he  fell  short  of  greatness,  and 
did  not  build  a  lasting  monument,  because  he  failed 

'  The  two  volumes.  Modern  Egypt,  are  well  worth  the  attention  of 
the  general  reader.  The  third  volume,  Abbas  Hilmi,  written  since 
the  war  started,  is  totally  imworthy  of  its  author,  and  is  a  sad  testi- 
mony to  the  fact  that  the  sanest  and  fairest  of  men  were  swept  away 
by  passion  and  prejudice  after  the  outbreak  of  the  present  war.  If 
there  is  anything  that  is  repugnant  to  the  Anglo-Saxon  nature  it  is 
kicking  a  man  when  he  is  down.  Undoubtedly,  Lord  Cromer  regrets 
very  deeply  this  little  volume,  which  represents  neither  his  spirit 
nor  that  of  his  fellow-countrymen.  We  must  throw  out  A  bbas  Hilmi, 
and  judge  Lord  Cromer  by  Modern  Egypt.  We  can  give  no  higher 
praise  to  the  book  than  to  say  that  it  is  worthy  of  the  subject  and  the 
writer. 

408 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


to  realize  that  the  people  to  whom  he  had  given  the 
material  benefits  of  European  civilization,  from  the 
very  reason  that  he  had  given  them  those  benefits, 
had  come  to  the  place  where  they  refused  longer  to 
be  treated  as  children,  and  wanted  other  things  that 
are  the  right  and  privilege  of  European  civilization. 
Egypt  was  his  child.  But  if  he  had  had  a  son,  and 
treated  him  straight  through  twenty-five  years  as  he 
treated  Egypt  and  Egypt's  Khedive,  he  would  have 
had  exactly  the  same  result.  He  left  us  unloved." 
This  was  certainly  the  verdict  of  Egypt  at  the 
time.  A  farewell  demonstration  was  organized  at 
the  Cairo  Opera  House.  Except  the  officials,  who  had 
to  go  for  fear  of  losing  their  places,  ho  prominent 
Egyptians  were  present.  The  only  member  of  the 
khedivial  family  in  attendance  was  Prince  Said 
Halim  (now  Grand  Vizier  of  Turkey),  who  was 
on  the  outs  with  the  Khedive  and  went  to  spite  him. 
When  Lord  Cromer  departed  from  Cairo,  elaborate 
military  and  police  measures  were  taken  to  protect 
him  from  insult  and  bodily  injury. 

The  program  Lord  Cromer  left  for  Egypt  was: 
abolition  of  the  capitulations,  so  the  Government 
would  have  control  over  the  foreigners  in  the  coun- 
try ;  participation  of  all  residents  in  a  legislative  body ; 
an  ideal  of  Egyptian  nationality,  which  took  in  all 
the  inhabitants,  irrespective  of  race,  religion,  or 
extraction. 

The  new  Consul-General,  Sir  Eldon  Gorst,  was  a 
man  of  pronounced  democratic  tendencies  and  liberal 
sympathies.  He  started  in  by  determining  not  to 
"put  on  airs,"  and  his  Jeffersonian  simplicity  led 

409 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


him  to  appear  in  the  streets  of  Cairo  hatless,  astride 
a  donkey.  This,  of  course,  was  the  ridiculous  other 
extreme  of  pomposity.  Aloofness  in  a  high  official 
is  no  greater  weakness  than  "hail  fellow  well  met." 
In  a  speech  to  his  staff,  Sir  Eldon  declared  that  the 
aim  of  the  British  occupation  was  not  to  rule  the 
Egyptians,  but  to  teach  them  to  rule  themselves. 
This  was  immediately  taken  up  by  the  Nationalists, 
who  asked  the  embarrassing  question:  How  can  a 
nation  he  taught  to  ride  themselves  so  long  as  they  are 
not  granted  the  slightest  bit  of  real  responsibility  and 
real  authority? 

Mustafa  Kamel  died  in  February,  1908.  He  did 
not  live  to  see  the  success  of  his  party  in  the  elections 
for  the  Legislative  Council,  and  the  dissension 
immediately  following,  which  resulted  in  a  party 
split.  The  Nationalist  program  was:  administrative 
independence  of  Egypt  under  khedivial  authority; 
fulfillment  of  British  pledges  to  terminate  occupation ; 
representative  institutions  with  full  political  and 
administrative  powers ;  free  primary  education  in  the 
Arabic  language;  preferential  employment  of  Egyp- 
tians in  government  services;  extension  of  jurisdic- 
tion of  mixed  courts  to  criminal  cases  in  which 
foreigners  are  concerned.  In  December,  the  Council 
passed  a  unanimous  motion,  calling  upon  the  Govern- 
ment to  initiate  legislation  to  give  the  country  full 
participation  in  internal  administration.  The  Coun- 
cil called  attention  to  the  fact  that  only  twenty- 
four  per  cent,  of  the  boys  of  school  age  were  given 
an  opportunity  to  go  to  school. 

The  Young  Turk  Revolution,  which  gave  Turkey  a 

410 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


Constitution  and  a  Parliament,  had  a  tremendous 
repercussion  in  Egypt.  The  NationaHst  newspapers 
reprinted  the  glowing  articles  of  the  English  press 
in  commendation  of  representative  government  in 
Turkey,  and  asked  how  the  English  cotild  sincerely 
sustain  the  Young  Turks  while  they  suppressed  the 
Young  Egyptians.  Lewa  began  to  publish  violent 
and  inflammatory  articles.  When  the  Khedive 
and  his  Cabinet  did  not  come  out  boldly  for  the 
Nationalist  cause,  they  too  received  as  severe  press 
criticism  as  the  British  "intruders."  The  answer 
was  that  which  has  invariably  met  the  first  efforts 
of  people  for  self-government  in  every  country:  a 
press  law,  with  a  system  of  fines,  suspensions,  and 
suppressions,  was  introduced.  But  it  was  wholly 
contrary  to  the  Liberal  spirit  of  Anglo-Saxondom, 
and  gained  for  the  Nationalists  sympathy  and  active 
support  in  England,  which  might  have  helped  greatly 
their  cause,  had  they  not  resorted  to  violence  and 
crime.  On  September  14,  1909,  the  twenty-seventh 
anniversary  of  the  British  occupation,  the  following 
telegram  was  sent  from  Cairo  to  the  British  Prime 
Minister  and  the  Turkish  Grand  Vizier: 

"A  meeting  of  six  thousand  Egyptians  assembled 
here  to-day  desires  to  convey  to  Your  Excellency 
the  unanimous  and  energetic  i)rotest  of  the  Egyptian 
people  against  the  British  occupation,  and  demands 
from  to-day  the  evacuation,  relying  upon  the  engage- 
ments and  solemn  oaths  of  the  Queen's  Governments. 
Moreover,  to  gain  our  fricndshii)  is  preferable  for 
English  honor  than  to  lose  our  hearts  and  sup- 
port." 

411 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


On  February  20,  1910,  the  Egyptian  Premier, 
Boutros  Pasha,  was  assassinated  by  a  Moslem 
Nationalist,  who  had  been  correspondent  for  Lewa 
at  the  Young  Egyptian  Congress  in  Geneva  the  year 
before.  No  connection  was  proved  between  the 
assassination  and  the  Nationalist  party.  But  the 
Nationalists — or  rather  the  radical  element  of  them 
— did  not  condemn  the  crime.  In  fact,  they  con- 
sidered the  assassin  a  hero:  and  he  has  become  their 
martyr.  This  crime  was  the  culmination  of  the 
breach  that  had  long  been  growing  among  the 
Nationalists.  Boutros  Pasha  was  a  Copt.  The 
Copts  could  no  longer  sustain  a  national  movement 
that  had  become  anti-Christian.  The  moderate 
section  of  the  Moslems  among  the  Nationalists  were 
certain  that  the  party  policy  of  violence  was  ruinous. 
They  seceded.'    In  the  summer  of  1910,  there  were 

'The  split  really  occurred  in  1908,  but  there  were  hopes  for  two 
years  of  a  reconciliation.  The  temperament  of  the  Egyptians  makes 
them  opposed  to  violence.  One  might  say  that  the  middle-aged  and 
elder  Egyptians  had  never  looked  upon  the  program  of  the  National- 
ists with  a  feeling  other  than  that  of  misgiving  and  alarm.  The 
"Party  of  the  People"  was  formed,  which  claimed  to  be  in  entire 
sympathy  with  the  Nationalists'  demands  upon  Britain,  but  believed 
in  confining  the  propaganda  to  a  rational  and  courteous  discussion 
of  the  problem  of  emancipation,  and  in  refraining  from  an  agitation 
that  would  awaken  religious  fanaticism  and  hatred  of  foreigners. 
This  Party  founded  its  own  newspaper,  Garidah.  The  Nationalists 
claimed  that  the  new  Party  represented  notables  and  rich  pro- 
prietors. But  there  was  a  question  of  division  far  more  serious  than 
that  of  Liberal  and  Conservative  temperament.  The  Nationalists 
advocated  close  union  with  Turkey,  while  the  Party  of  the  People 
believed  that  the  only  hope  of  Egypt  was  in  keeping  absolutely  free. 
Later,  a  third  party,  the  partisans  of  the  Khedive,  through  the  news- 
paper Moyaed,  pronounced  for  a  propaganda  to  convince  the  British 

412 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


two  Young  Egyptian  congresses  in  Europe,  one 
branch  sitting  at  Geneva  and  the  other  at  Brussels. 
Both  called  on  England  once  more  to  fulfil  her 
pledges  to  evacuate  Egypt. 

A  popular  movement  can  be  successful  only  if  it 
fvdfils  three  conditions:  remaining  united;  enlisting 
a  number  of  men  who  have  political  prestige  and 
wealth;  and  winning  the  officers  of  the  army.  The 
Nationalist  Party,  although  all  Egyptians  were  in 
sympathy  with  its  general  aims,  failed  in  all  three 
of  the  essentials  of  success.  At  the  beginning,  the 
movement  would  have  amounted  to  nothing,  had  it 
not  been  backed  by  French  influence.  After  the 
French  abandoned  them,  the  Nationalists  would  not 
have  been  a  serious  menace,  had  they  not  been 
able  still  to  enHst  influences  outside  of  Egypt:  pan- 
Islamism  and  the  Young  Turks  in  the  suzerain 
Ottoman  Empire,  and  radical  sentiment  in  England. 
The  Turkish  aid  disappeared  with  the  Italian  and 
Balkan  wars,  and  EngHsh  help  was  largely  lost  by 
the  assassination  of  Boutros  Pasha. 

Former  President  Roosevelt,  on  his  way  home  from 
a  hunting  trip  in  Central  Africa,  arrived  in  Cairo 
shortly  after  the  assassination  of  Boutros  Pasha. 
According  to  his  usual  custom  of  getting  down  off 
the  fence  and  taking  the  bull  by  the  horns,  Mr. 
Roosevelt  told  the  students  of  Cairo  University  that 


that  it  was  to  their  best  interests  to  fulfil  the  solemn  promise  made  to 
evacuate  Egypt.  The  Khedivial  party,  having  no  illusions  concern- 
ing the  ability  of  the  Egyptians  to  start  a  revolution  without  or  with 
the  aid  of  Turkey,  knew  that  evacuation  or  the  granting  of  self- 
government  would  come  only  from  the  free  act  of  the  British. 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


he  did  not  consider  Egypt  ready  for  self-government,' 
and  later  in  London  he  told  the  British  that  they 
ought  either  to  rule  Eg^'pt  or  to  get  out.  While 
the  first  statement  shocked  Liberals  on  both  sides 
of  the  Atlantic,  and  the  second  was  a  rude  jolt  to  the 
complacency  of  insular  Britons,  none  who  was 
acquainted  with  the  situation  contested  the  truth 
of  either  observation.  When  press  and  Parliament 
were  full  of  Mr.  Roosevelt's  "impetuosity,"  Sir 
Edward  Grey,  commenting  on  the  Roosevelt  speech 
at  the  Guildhall,  stated  for  the  first  time  openly  and 
without  equivocation  that  Great  Britain  intended 
to  rule  and  w^as  not  going  to  get  out.  This  was  an 
answer,  not  only  to  Mr.  Roosevelt's  critics,  but  also 
to  the  Egyptians,  who  had  just  been  celebrating 
with  enthusiasm  the  rejection  by  the  Egyptian 
General  Assembly  of  the  proposition  to  extend  for 
forty  years  beyond  1968  the  concession  of  the 
Suez  Canal  Company.  Sir  Edward  Grey  para- 
phrased the  saying  of  President  Cleveland,  by 
declaring  that  in  Egypt  "we  have  to  consider 
facts  rather  than  theories."  His  attitude  was  very 
different  from  the  vacillation  of  earlier  Liberal 
Foreign  Secretaries. 

The  Copts  are  the  descendants  of  the  Egyptians 
who  were  not  assimilated  by  the  Arabs  at  the 
time  of  the  Mohammedan  conquest.    They  took 

'  The  New  York  Nation  of  April  7,  1910,  commenting  unfavorably 
upon  this  speech,  declared:  "Egyptians  .  .  .  have  the  recent  ex- 
perience of  Turkey  to  hearten  them."  The  most  serious  American 
journals,  even  after  nearly  two  years,  were  still  in  complete  ignorance 
of  what  was  happening  in  Turkey. 

414 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 

the  language  and  many  of  the  customs  of  the  con- 
querors, but  preserved  their  religion.  As  in  Tur- 
key, this  surviving  Christian  element  of  the 
earlier  civilization,  by  the  fact  that  it  remained 
poHtically  inferior  and  socially  distinct  from  the 
ruling  race,  developed  remarkable  commercial  abili- 
ties. As  the  Moslems  were  prevented  by  their  reli- 
gion from  exercising  the  profession  of  money-lending, 
the  Copts  became  the  bankers.  All  through  the 
Near  East  the  Christians — Greeks,  Armenians, 
Syrians,  and  Copts — are  what  the  Jews  are  in 
Christian  countries,  and  for  similar  reasons.  When 
European  civiHzation  and  European  finance  and 
European  economic  and  political  conditions  were 
introduced  into  Moslem  lands,  the  Christian  elements 
were  already  prepared  to  take  advantage  of  the 
revolution  effected  by  contact  with  the  Occident. 
The  missionaries  who  came,  finding  the  door  shut  to 
their  proselytizing  efforts  among  the  Moslems, 
started  into  catholicize  and  protestantize  the  Eastern 
Christians.  Not  many  were  weaned  away  from  their 
own  Church.  But  almost  all  came  under  the  edu- 
cational influence  of  the  missionaries.  They  learned 
our  ways  and  our  languages.  This,  also,  was  a 
tremendous  advantage  in  enabling  them  to  profit  by 
the  new  conditions.  So  it  was  not  unnatural  that 
the  Moslem  ruling  races  became  jealous  of  their 
Christian  subject  races,  and  suspected  them  of  being 
a  reason  for  and  party  to  European  intervention, 
and  the  humiliating  political  infcodation  of  Moham- 
medan Africa  and  Asia  to  Christian  Europe.  The 
Christians  of  the  Balkan  Peninsula  and  Asia  Minor 

415 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


have  unquestionably  been  victims  of  European 
colonial  ambitions  and  rivalries. 

The  Copts,  like  the  Armenians  in  Turkey,  looked 
upon  the  constitutional  movement  in  Islam  as  a 
means  of  deliverance  from  the  bond  of  servitude 
and  the  ever  present  shadow  of  massacre.  They 
were  not  only  willing,  but  eager,  to  cooperate  in  the 
Nationalist  movement,  until  they  realized  that  the 
Young  Moslems  connotated  nationahty  as  religious 
and  racial,  and  not  geographical.  The  assassination 
of  Boutros  Pasha  was  an  unwelcome,  though  not 
unexpected,  awakening.  Shortly  after  the  crime, 
Sir  Edward  Grey,  in  answer  to  an  interpellation  in 
Parliament,  declared  that  "it  is  false  that  England 
in  Egypt  is  sowing  dissension  between  the  Copts  and 
the  Moslems."  This  is  undoubtedly  true.  The  sus- 
picion arose,  probably,  from  the  fact  that  the  British 
administration  in  Egypt,  under  Sir  Eldon  Gorst, 
began  to  do  all  in  its  power  to  alienate  promising 
Nationalists  from  the  cause  by  the  bribe  of  giving 
them  Government  positions;  and  that  this  policy 
aroused  the  resentment  of  the  Copts  against  the 
Moslems  and  made  easier  the  stifling  of  liberal 
aspirations  and  Anglophobia  in  the  younger  gen- 
eration. 

Against  the  advice  of  the  head  of  their  Church 
and  of  some  of  their  leading  men,  the  Copts  held  a 
Congress  in  March,  1911,  in  Assiut,  which  was  at- 
tended by  five  hundred  delegates.  The  ostensible 
object  was  to  "remove  the  causes  of  difference 
between  the  various  communities,  constituting  the 
Egyptian  nation."    Sir  Eldon  Gorst  rejected  all 

416 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 


their  demands.  Their  chief  complaint  was  that  they 
were  discriminated  against  in  the  fiUing  of  pubHc 
offices.  One  finds  it  very  difficult  to  sympathize 
with  the  Coptic  position,  on  grounds  of  their  best 
national  interests  as  well  as  of  elementary  justice. 
The  Copts  had  more  than  half  the  posts  in  the 
Egyptian  civil  service,  although  they  comprised 
less  than  ten  per  cent,  of  the  population!  They 
argued,  and  still  argue,  that  this  is  because  they 
have  ten  times  as  many  educated  young  men  as  the 
Moslems. 

The  fatal  weakness  of  education  upon  Orientals, 
Moslems  as  well  as  Christians,  is  the  demoralization 
that  seems  to  follow  it.  When  an  Oriental  has  his 
diploma,  he  feels  that  he  is  a  gentleman,  and  that  he 
must  follow  a  profession  in  a  big  city,  or  get  a  Govern- 
ment position.  He  does  not  want  to  return  to  his 
village.  Farming,  where  he  has  to  do  any  of  the 
work  with  his  own  hands,  is  unthinkable.  Com- 
merce is  unattractive.  Business  is  for  men  without 
an  education.  For  those  who  have  not  the  money 
or  persistence  or  brains  to  qualify  for  a  profession, 
Government  service  is  the  summum  bonum,  no,  the 
solum  bonum.  Cairo  and  Alexandria  are  full  of 
young  men,  whose  education  has  spoiled  them  for 
any  other  pursuit  than  that  of  sitting  around  cafes. 
Not  until  we  can  instil  into  the  Oriental  mind  that 
agriculture  and  commerce  are  dignified  callings, 
demanding  the  best  brains  of  the  nation,  will  educa- 
tion prepare  Oriental  nations  for  self-government. 
The  East  needs  primary  education  and  industrial 
schools,  where  enthusiastic  and  devoted  teachers 
a7  417 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


glorify  by  example  as  well  as  by  precept  the  dignity 
of  labor,  before  it  needs  more  colleges  and  universi- 
ties. The  young  Oriental,  who  possesses  financial 
resources,  is  able  to  go  to  Europe  or  America  for  his 
higher  education.  The  village  boys  had  better  be 
taught  farming  and  stock-raising  and  trades  and 
business. 

Sir  Eldon  Gorst  died  in  July,  191 1.  Long  before 
the  end  came,  he  was  a  very  sick  man,  and,  perhaps 
largely  for  that  reason,  seemed  discouraged  and  pessi- 
mistic. His  last  public  utterance  on  Egyptian  affairs 
was:  "The  policy  of  ruling  the  country  in  co- 
operation with  native  ministers  is,  at  the  present 
time,  incompatible  with  that  of  encouraging  the 
development  of  so-called  representative  institu- 
tions. .  .  .  The  recent  experiment  has,  so  far  as  the 
Legislative  Council  and  General  Assembly  are  con- 
cerned, proved  a  failure,  and  the  results  derived 
from  them  have  not  been  in  accordance  with  our 
intentions  or  hopes." 

Italy's  declaration  of  war  against  Turkey,  for  the 
purpose  of  taking  away  the  last  province  of  the  Otto- 
man Empire  in  Africa,  marked  the  beginning  of  a 
crisis  in  the  relations  of  Europe  to  the  Near  East 
that  has  not  yet  ended.  The  British  Cabinet  knew 
that  a  strong  man,  who  was  intimately  acquainted 
with  the  Egyptian  situation,  must  be  appointed 
to  Sir  Eldon  Gorst 's  place.  There  was  only  one  man 
who  filled  the  bill.  From  the  first  days  of  the 
British  occupation  to  the  Boer  War,  Kitchener  had 
made  his  career  in  Egypt.  He  returned  in  November, 
191 1,  to  grapple  with  a  situation  that  needed  "the 

418 


EGYPT  UNDER  THE  LAST  KHEDIVE 

big  stick"  as  well  as  intimate  personal  experience 
of  Islam,  Egypt,  Turkey,  and  North  African  military 
conditions.  The  situation  was  one  of  great  delicacy. 
Turkey  had  a  right  to  call  upon  Egypt  for  aid,  or  at 
least  to  allow  the  passage  of  troops  and  military 
supplies.  But  Great  Britain,  through  diplomatic 
agreements,  was  bound  to  preserve  the  neutrality  of 
Egypt.  Even  those  Egyptians  who  were  hostile  to 
a  rapprochement  between  Egypt  and  Turkey,  sympa- 
thized with  Turkey  on  sentimental  as  well  as  religious 
grounds.  Italy  seemed  to  be  attacking  Islam.  The 
way  the  war  was  started,  and  the  inability  of  the 
Italians  to  solve  the  military  situation  they  had 
created  for  themselves  in  Tripoli,  disgusted  every- 
body in  Egypt,  Europeans  as  well  as  natives.  I 
have  never  mot  a  British  official  who  sympathized 
with  Italian  ambitions  or  Italian  methods. 

Lord  Kitchener  succeeded  remarkably  in  suppress- 
ing agitation  and  in  strengthening  Britain's  hold  on 
Egypt.  In  view  of  the  test  that  was  going  to  come 
in  1 9 14,  Kitchener's  three  years  in  Egypt,  following 
the  Gorst  regime,  were  extremely  fortunate  for  the 
British  Empire.  A  mad  conspiracy  to  assassinate 
the  Khedive,  the  Prime  Minister,  ihe  British  Consul- 
General,  and  two  judges  was  discovered  in  1912  in  the 
inner  circle  of  the  Nationalist  Party.  It  gave  Lord 
Kitchener  the  opportunity  to  suppress  Lewa,  and  to 
put  the  moving  spirit  of  the  Nationalists  into  jail 
for  fifteen  years.  Lord  Kitchener  built  extensive 
barracks  at  Cairo.  He  devoted  his  energies  to 
organizing  an  efficient  secret  service  throughout 
Egypt,  and  to  getting  a  complete  hold  on  the  native 

419 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


officers  of  the  army.  He  made  an  excellent  move 
to  win  the  Moslem  clergy  by  creating  a  Ministry  of 
Wakfs  (religious  foundations).  Trying  to  control 
the  expenditure  of  the  revenues  from  religious 
foundations  along  European  lines  had  proved  as 
impolitic  as  it  was  hopeless.  If  the  Moslem  clergy- 
had  some  leeway  in  the  spending  and  accounting 
for  the  Wakf  revenues,  they  would  be  more  satisfied 
to  accept  a  tolerant  British  control.  If  occasionally 
a  village  Imam  wanted  to  buy  a  goat  with  the  money 
instead  of  repairing  the  mosque,  why  interfere  and 
gain  his  ill-will? 

Lord  Kitchener's  report  for  191 3  was  able  to  show 
splendid  economic  progress,  and  a  continuance  of  the 
material  benefits  that  Lord  Cromer's  administration 
had  given  to  Egypt.  There  was  no  political  unrest. 
But  the  increase  in  crime  was  alarming.  The 
British  Adviser  in  the  Ministry  of  Justice,  who  had 
examined  carefully  the  dossiers  from  all  over  the 
country  stated  that  crime  was  in  no  sense  due  to 
poverty  or  to  lack  of  means  to  lead  an  orderly  life. 
The  elections  at  the  end  of  19 13  were  marked  by  a 
complete  indifference  of  voters.  Egypt  was  apathetic. 
The  Egyptians  were  showing  an  annually  increasing 
tendency  to  break  the  law.  Murders  and  theft 
over-taxed  police  and  judges. 


420 


CHAPTER  XXI 


EGYPT  BECOMES  A  BRITISH 
PROTECTORATE 

ITTLE  was  said  about  the  Khedive  in  the 


last  chapter:  for  there  was  little  to  say. 


He  had  reigned  for  over  twenty  years  when 
the  war  of  1914  broke  out;  but  he  had  not  ruled. 
During  the  last  ten  years  of  the  Cromer  regime, 
Abbas  Hilmi  had  frequently  been  troublesome.  He 
had  never  been  dangerous.  In  the  man  himself, 
the  gambler's  spirit  was  lacking.  From  the  moment 
he  arrived  at  the  age  to  realize  the  humiliation  of 
his  position,  he  rebelled  inwardly.  Like  the  great 
majority  of  his  fellow-countrymen,  he  detested  the 
English,  and  wanted  to  get  rid  of  them.  But  he 
was  cowed  by  Lord  Cromer:  for  he  had  been  told 
plainly  that  opposition  meant  deposition.  He  had 
a  splendid  "berth"  as  Khedive  of  Egypt, — honors, 
money,  palaces.  To  win  power  he  would  not  risk 
privileges. 

Had  there  been  no  Nationalist  movement  and 
no  pan-Islamic  movement  at  the  beginning  of  the 
twentieth  century,  Abbas  Hilmi  would  have  re- 
mained innocuous,  and  British  Consuls-General 
could  have  continued  to  snap  their  fingers  at  him. 


421 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


But  a  ruler  who  put  himself  at  the  head  of  a  popular 
movement  could  easily  have  been  dangerous  to  the 
British  administration.  From  the  legal  point  of 
view  and  from  the  moral  point  of  view,  he  would 
have  had  right  on  his  side,  and  nowhere  in  Europe 
would  public  sentiment  have  rallied  to  his  support 
more  quickly  and  more  generously  than  in  the  very 
country  from  which  the  intruders  came.  Abbas 
Hilmi  missed  a  great  opportunity  of  becoming  ruler 
of  Egypt  when  the  Nationalist  Party  was  in  its 
hey-day.  There  would  have  been  strength,  and  a 
glorious  opportunity  for  Abbas  Hilmi,  also,  had  he 
come  out  boldly  and  staked  his  throne  upon  the 
question  of  loyalty  and  fulfillment  of  obligations  to 
his  suzerain,  the  Sultan  of  Turkey.  He  had  several 
excellent  opportunities  to  put  the  British  in  an 
embarrassing  position  before  the  Moslem  world 
and  in  the  eyes  of  Europe  as  well.  If  the  Khedive 
had  come  out  openly  as  a  supporter  of  the  pan- 
Islamic  movement,  and  had  he  refused  to  accede 
to  Cromer's  demands  in  connection  with  the  Sinai 
Peninsula  controversy,  the  British  would  hardly 
have  dared  to  depose  him,  and  the  Turks  might  have 
gained  their  point.  There  was  much  nervousness 
in  British  Cabinet  Councils  over  the  effect  of  the 
pan-Islamic  agitation  in  India,  and  the  new  Parlia- 
ment was  extremely  Liberal.  Lord  Cromer  had  the 
good  fortune  to  be  dealing  with  a  weakling. 

Sir  Eldon  Gorst  tried  to  establish  friendly  rela- 
tions between  the  Palace  and  the  British  Agency. 
This  he  succeeded  in  doing,  in  spite  of  the  change 
in  the  situation  in  Egypt  after  the  Young  Turk 

422 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


Revolution,  which  occurred  in  the  second  year  of 
Sir  Eldon's  incumbency.  There  seemed  to  be  a  real 
attachment  between  the  Khedive  and  the  Consul- 
General.  When  Sir  Eldon  Gorst  was  dying,  Abbas 
Hilmi  made  a  visit  to  England  to  see  him.  For  a 
while,  the  Nationalists,  especially  those  of  the  moder- 
ate wing,  had  high  hope  that  the  Khedive  would 
assert  himself,  and  demand  on  behalf  of  his  people  a 
radical  change  in  the  humiliating  policy  of  keeping 
Egypt  in  complete  political  tutelage.  When  the 
Italian  War  brought  Lord  Kitchener  once  more  to 
Egypt,  Abbas  Hilmi  had  his  last  chance  to  come  out 
unequivocally  on  the  Turkish  side  or  to  assure  the 
British  that  they  could  count  upon  his  loyalty. 
He  did  neither.  He  drifted  along,  suspected  by  the 
British  of  intriguing  with  their  enemies,  and  hated 
by  the  Nationalists  and  Turks  for  failing  in  his  duty 
as  rtder  of  the  nation  and  as  vassal  of  the  Sultan. 

Abbas  Hilmi  spent  much  time  at  his  estates  in 
Turkey,  and  was  at  his  summer  home  on  the  Bos- 
phorus  when  the  European  War  began.  He  refused 
to  declare  for  the  Allies,  and  stayed  on  in  Turkey 
after  the  Turks  decided  to  cast  in  their  fortunes  with 
the  Germans.  Like  every  one  else  who  was  in  touch 
with  what  was  happening  at  the  Sublime  Porte, 
Abbas  Hilmi  knew  well  enough,  from  the  very  be- 
ginning of  the  war,  that  the  Young  Turks  intended 
to  cast  in  the  lot  of  the  Ottoman  Empire  with  the 
Central  European  Powers.  A  member  of  the  Khe- 
divial  family,  Prince  Said  Halim,  was  the  Sultan's 
Grand  Vizier.  Had  Abbas  Hilmi 's  past  attitude 
been  one  of  constant  and  courageous  opposition  to 

423 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  British  occupation  of  his  country,  his  defection 
might  have  had  serious  results  for  the  British.  As 
it  was,  the  Khedive  had  become  a  neghgible  quantity 
with  his  own  subjects.  The  hotheads  had  tried 
twice  to  assassinate  him. '  The  moderates  knew  that 
he  was  a  hopeless  barrier  to  getting  any  concessions 
from  the  British.  It  was  the  chance  for  Great 
Britain  to  depose  the  Khedive,  and  to  establish  a 
definite  status  by  making  Egypt  a  part  of  the  British 
Empire.  Abbas  Hilmi's  desertion  of  his  country 
and  his  unpopularity  among  all  classes  of  his  subjects 
made  his  deposition  easy.  The  state  of  war  with 
Turkey  dissolved  Britain's  obligations  to  the  Sultan. 

Shortly  after  his  deposition,  I  saw  Abbas  Hilmi 
in  Vienna.  He  was  cheerful  and  unruffled,  and 
did  not  seem  worried  about  having  lost  his  throne. 
I  think  he  was  not  at  all  misled  by  the  hope  that 
German  victory  would  lead  to  his  reinstatement  in 
Cairo,  rid  of  the  British  occupation.  Like  Abdul 
Aziz  and  Hafid  in  Morocco,  his  only  preoccupation 
was  the  thought  of  the  revenues  from  his  estates.' 
Of  these  he  felt  that  he  would  be  assured.  Not 
only  were  the  British  just,  but  they  knew  how  im- 
portant it  was  to  purchase  immunity  from  intrigues. 

'  The  second  attempt  was  in  Constantinople  on  July  25,  1914,  just 
a  week  before  the  war.  The  bullet  hit  the  Khedive  in  the  face.  The 
assailant  stated  that  he  was  moved  by  the  desire  to  rid  Egypt  of  a 
ruler  who  was  betraying  his  people  by  refusing  to  lead  them. 

» Hafid,  whom  the  French  had  deposed  in  Morocco  after  they 
found  that  he  would  not  work  loyally  with  them  under  the  Protec- 
torate, was  consoled  by  a  large  pension.  But  he,  like  Abbas  Hilmi, 
believed  in  the  ultimate  success  of  the  Germans,  and  risked  his  pen- 
sion to  cast  in  his  fortunes  with  them.  The  last  I  heard  of  him  he  was 
living  in  a  German  milieu  at  Barcelona. 

424 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


Abbas  Hilmi  is  like  many  a  man  bom  with  a  silver 
spoon  in  his  mouth.  He  had  homage  and  wealth 
through  no  effort  of  his  own,  and  the  joy  of  privi- 
leges was  ample  compensation  for  renouncing  the 
glory  of  responsibilities.  Will  and  ability  are  rarely 
handed  down  from  father  to  son:  the  former  is 
developed  through  necessity  and  the  latter  through 
effort. 

Lord  Kitchener,  also,  was  away  from  Egypt 
when  the  war  broke  out.  He  was  needed  at  home 
for  the  greatest  task  of  his  life.  During  the  first 
three  months  of  the  war,  Egypt  was  forgotten  in 
the  tremendous  march  of  events  in  Europe.  I  was 
in  Paris  during  these  months.  My  especial  interest 
in  the  Near  East  led  me  to  scan  eagerly  the  news- 
papers for  telegrams  from  Constantinople  and 
Cairo.  Only  once  was  there  mention  of  Egypt,  when 
a  news  item,  given  out  in  London,  announced  that 
it  had  been  found  necessary  to  intern  Germans  and 
Austrians.  But  the  entry  of  Turkey  into  the  war, 
and  the  defection  of  the  Khedive,  brought  a  new 
situation.  From  Berlin  it  was  announced  that  the 
Turks  were  going  to  reoccupy  Egypt.  The  import- 
ance of  this  menace  was,  of  course,  the  Suez  Canal. 
If  the  Germans  could  get  control  of  the  Canal, 
they  would  strike  a  more  serious  blow  at  the  British 
Empire  than  by  any  other  move  they  could  make. 
I  was  in  Berlin  when  the  Egyptian  campaign  was 
being  widely  discussed  in  the  press  and  in  political 
circles.  Great  hopes  were  expressed,  through  the 
seizure  of  the  Suez  Canal,  not  only  of  winning  the 
war  by  bringing  Britain  to  her  knees,  quickly, 

425 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


but  also  of  permanent  German  control  of  Asiatic 
commerce. 

Immediately  upon  receipt  of  the  news  in  Cairo 
that  hope  had  been  abandoned  of  preventing  Tur- 
key from  joining  Germany,  the  numerous  Turkish 
agents  and  the  dangerous  agitators  among  the  Egyp- 
tians were  quietly  gathered  in  by  the  police,  and 
deported  to  Malta  before  they  knew  what  had  hap- 
pened. Sir  John  Maxwell,  who  was  in  command  of 
the  British  Army  of  Occupation,'  was  given  full 
powers  from  London,  and  assured  that  the  first 
Australian  and  New  Zealand  contingents  would  be 
started  immediately  to  complete  their  training  in 
Egypt.  Other  troops  were  sent  out  from  England. 
Sir  John  Maxwell,  like  Lord  Kitchener  and  Sir 
Reginald  Win  gate,  was  one  of  the  "old  guard"  of 
British  ofhcers  in  the  Egyptian  army,  who  made 
their  career  in  Egypt.  He  knew  all  the  ins  and  outs 
of  Egyptian  life,  and  the  attitude  of  the  leading 
men  toward  the  British  occupation.  He  was  one 
of  those  rare  Englishmen  who  had  won  the  affection 
of  the  Moslems.  Bitter  enemies  of  the  English 
have  assured  me  that  Sir  John  was  the  type  of  man 

'  In  1906,  the  British  forces  were  increased  by  a  cavalry  regiment, 
an  artillery  battery,  and  an  infantry  battahon.  This  increased  the 
expense  for  the  maintenance  of  the  British  troops,  borne  entirely 
by  Egypt,  from  half  a  million  to  three  quarters  of  a  milUon  dollars 
per  annum.  Cf.  Mr.  Haldane's  speech  in  the  House  of  Commons  on 
July  5,  1910.  One  tremendous  advantage  that  Great  Britain  en- 
joys from  her  colonial  empire  is  the  ability  to  have  in  training  and 
ready  for  use,  without  any  expense  to  the  British  taxpayers,  soldiers 
and  army  officers  and  civilian  officials.  Many  of  Britain's  most 
celebrated  administrators  and  generals  have  been  developed  with 
very  little,  if  any,  expense  to  the  budget. 

426 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


to  popularize  British  rule  in  Egypt,  if  only  there  were 
more  of  his  kind.  He  did  not  make  the  Egyptians 
feel  that  they  were  social  inferiors.  When  he  called 
the  Bedouin  Sheiks  to  the  British  Agency  on  Novem- 
ber 2,  1914,  and  broke  the  news  to  them  of  the  state 
of  war  with  Turkey,  he  was  talking  to  friends,  and 
not  to  a  group  of  men  who  bowed  to  his  will  only  be- 
cause he  had  superior  force.  They  agreed  to  stand 
by  him.  This  was  the  beginning  of  Germany's 
deception  concerning  the  Khalif's  power  over  the 
Mohammedan  world,  which  came  to  the  climax 
eighteen  months  later  in  the  rebellion  of  the  Shereef 
of  Mecca.  ^ 

The  great  problem  was  to  secure  a  new  ruler  for 
Egypt.  It  was  known  at  this  time  that  the  Khedive 
would  not  return,  and  the  news  was  a  relief,  for 
Abbas  Hilmi  would  have  been  an  embarrassment, 
if  not  a  danger,  to  the  British.  Negotiations  were 
opened  with  the  uncle  of  the  Khedive,  Hussein 
Kamel,  the  eldest  living  representative  of  the  family 
of  Mohammed  Ali.  Under  Mohammedan  law  he 
should  have  been  the  rtiler  of  Egypt.  Prince  Hus- 
sein was  in  no  hurry  to  accept  the  British  overtures. 
He  was  a  man  of  the  old  school,  who  had  been  from 
his  youth  a  reader  and  a  thinker.  His  culture  was 
wholly  French,  and  he  could  not  speak  English. 
His  European  experience  and  his  European  associa- 
tions were  mostly  with  France.    He  had  been  in 

'  The  story  of  this  far-reaching  event,  which  is  Roing  to  have  a 
vital  part  in  the  relations  of  Imperial  Britain  and  Imperial  France 
with  Islam,  and  in  the  future  of  Western  and  Central  Asia,  is  treated 
in  my  New  Map  of  Asia,  now  in  preparation. 

427 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


exile  in  his  youth,  owing  to  differences  of  opinion 
with  his  father,  the  Khedive  Ismail,  and  since  the 
British  occupation  had  abstained  from  mixing  in 
politics.  His  passion  was  agriculture,  and  he  had 
lived  for  thirty  years  the  life  of  a  country  gentleman. 
Of  all  the  princes  of  the  kliedivial  family.  Prince 
Hussein  alone  had  abstained  from  entering  the 
service  of  Abdul  Hamid,  and  becoming  contaminated 
by  the  degrading  Yildiz  Kiosk  influences.  He  had 
no  illusions  about  the  hopeless  degeneracy  of  the 
Turkish  ruling  caste,  and  the  inability  of  the  Young 
Turks  to  recreate  a  strong  Islamic  state  in  the  spirit 
of  Occidental  and  twentieth  century  civilization. 
On  the  other  hand,  he  was  thoroughly  convinced 
that  the  inherent  liberal  spirit  of  the  French  and 
British  nations  made  them  the  safe  mentors  and 
just  guardians  of  Islamic  interests. 

After  six  weeks  of  pourparlers,  Prince  Hussein 
consented  to  accept  the  rulership  of  Egypt  under 
a  British  Protectorate.  On  December  17,  1914,  the 
British  Government  announced  that  the  relation 
between  Turkey  and  Egypt  was  severed,  and  that 
Egypt  was  now  a  British  Protectorate.  Sir  Henry 
McMahon  was  appointed  High  Commissioner.  The 
next  day  Prince  Hussein  became  Sultan  of  Egypt. 
I  have  had  the  honor  and  privilege  of  several  long 
conversations  with  the  Sultan,  and  have  had  from 
his  own  mouth  the  story  of  the  negotiations  of 
November  and  December,  19 14,  and  the  explanation 
of  the  motives  that  led  the  Sultan  to  accept  the  call 
to  rule  Egypt  under  British  protection.  The  Sultan 
is  a  great  admirer  of  Mohammed  Ali,  the  founder  of 

428 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


his  House.  He  believes  that  it  is  his  duty  to  carry 
out  the  program  of  Mohammed  AH,  the  two  cardinal 
points  of  which  were:  complete  separation  from 
Turkey,  and  the  introduction  of  Occidental  civiliza- 
tion. The  intention  of  Turkey  to  reconquer  Egypt 
with  the  aid  of  Germany  threatened  to  overthrow 
the  successful  achievement  of  Mohammed  Ali  in 
freeing  Egypt  from  the  Turkish  yoke.  The  reten- 
tion and  strengthening  of  the  bond  between  Great 
Britain  and  Egypt  was  the  best  way  of  securing  to 
the  Egyptians  the  complete  realization  of  the  eco- 
nomic and  social  prosperity  that  had  been  initiated 
by  Mohammed  Ali,  and  to  which  the  ancestors  of 
the  Sultan  had  given  their  lives. 

The  Khedive's  Premier,  Rushdi  Pasha,  rallied 
to  the  new  regime,  and  consented  to  stay  in  office 
as  head  of  the  Sultan's  Cabinet.  Most  of  the  lead- 
ing Egyptians  followed  his  example.  The  idea  of 
the  permanency  of  the  British  occupation  was  far 
less  distasteful  than  that  of  seeing  the  material 
prosperity  of  the  country  and  the  security  of  life 
and  property  jeopardized  by  a  Germano-Turkish 
invasion.  Even  among  the  older  pashas  of  Turkish 
origin,  who  hate  the  British  cordially  for  having 
destroyed  their  power  of  exploiting  the  natives  and 
their  privilege  of  dipping  into  the  public  treasury, 
there  was  little  joy  at  the  thought  of  having  to  deal 
with  the  Young  Turks.  In  no  country  in  the  world 
are  conservatives  in  favor  of  a  change  in  the  status 
quo.  The  class  that  has  wealth  in  lands  and  invest- 
ments, the  class  that  has  social  prestige  and  privi- 
leges, and  the  class  that  holds  public  offices,  stand 

429 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


together  to  stand  pat.  I  have  been  greatly  amused 
in  reading  glowing  accounts  of  Rumanians  of  Tran- 
sylvania, Italians  of  Trieste,  Croatians  of  Agram,  and 
other  inhabitants  of  terre  irredenta,  who  burn  to 
welcome  delivering  armies.  Personal  observation 
on  the  ground  has  taught  me  that  in  all  the  countries 
of  whose  nationalist  and  irredentist  movements  we 
hear  so  much,  the  prime  movers  and  agitators  are 
college  professors  and  professional  men  and  students, 
who  have  little  or  nothing  to  risk  or  lose  by  a  change 
of  government.  The  peasants  feel  the  call  of  blood 
only  after  they  have  been  worked  upon  and  stirred 
up  by  priests  and  schoolmasters  and  paid  political 
agents.  The  landowners  and  manufacturers  and 
business  men  rarely  allow  their  heart  to  run  away 
with  their  head.  They  know  which  side  their 
bread  is  buttered  on.  They  worship  the  golden  calf 
of  the  status  quo.  In  many  countries,  they  have 
confessed  this  to  me  with  frankness.  Egypt  is  no 
exception  to  the  general  rule. 

The  Turks  tried  hard  to  make  an  attack  upon 
Egypt  before  the  British  were  able  to  assemble 
sufficient  troops  for  the  defense  of  the  Canal  and 
for  overhauling  the  Egyptians.  General  Maxwell 
felt  it  wise  to  recall  the  Egyptian  garrisons  and  the 
initial  British  forces  that  had  been  sent  to  the  Turk- 
ish frontier.  They  fell  back  to  the  Canal,  leaving 
to  the  Turks  the  task  of  operating  in  the  desert  of 
the  Isthmus  and  the  mountainous  and  roadless 
Peninsula.  The  Turks  reached  the  Canal  with 
twelve  thousand  men  on  February  2,  191 5,  and  tried 
to  force  their  way  across  at  several  points.  They 

430 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


believed  that  if  they  once  got  into  Egypt  a  popular 
movement  would  sweep  the  British  out  of  the  coun- 
try. But  the  guns  of  French  and  British  warships, 
moored  in  the  Canal,  prevented  the  execution  of  this 
project.  The  risk  had  been  too  great,  however, 
for  the  lesson  not  to  be  learned.  Egypt  was  for- 
tunately on  the  way  from  Australasia  to  the  battle- 
fields of  Europe.  During  1915,  it  was  made  the 
training  ground  for  Australians  and  New  Zealanders, 
the  half-way  station  for  British  and  Indian  troops 
on  their  way  to  and  from  India,  and  the  base 
for  the  Dardanelles  and  Mesopotamia  operations. 
Thus  several  hundred  thousand  men  could  be  kept 
in  the  country  all  .the  time,  without  immobilizing 
them. 

When  the  Turks  fortified  El  Arish  and  Akaba,  and 
began  to  build  their  railway  to  the  Egyptian  fron- 
tier, they  spread  the  report  broadcast  in  Egypt  that 
they  were  coming  back  in  force  in  191 6  to  deliver 
the  captive  province  from  the  yoke  of  the  infidel. 
In  spite  of  a  rigid  censorship  and  an  extensively 
organized  secret  service,  news  of  the  humiliating 
disasters  inflicted  upon  the  British  by  the  Turks  at 
Gallipoli  and  in  Mesopotamia,  and  of  the  failure  of 
the  Salonika  expedition  to  save  Serbia,  reached  every 
village  of  Egypt.  As  prestige  means  everything  to 
the  Orientals,  and  as  the  British  knew  that  their 
hold  on  Egypt  was  solely  that  of  force,  the  beginning 
of  1 91 6  brought  to  the  Suez  Canal  an  army  organiza- 
tion separate  from  that  of  the  Army  of  Occupation. 
A  new  general  arrived,  with  his  own  staff,  and  a 
system  of  defense  was  organized  that  would  make  it 

431 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


impossible  for  the  Turks  to  reach  the  Canal  a  second 
time.  I  had  the  privilege  of  visiting  these  defenses. 
When  the  attack  against  Verdun  called  me  back  to 
France,  I  left  a  disappointed  lot  of  Tommies  and 
Colonials.  There  was  some  fighting  on  the  western 
front  against  the  Senussi;  but  the  Canal  remained 
farther  from  "the  front"  than  Paris.  During  the 
spring  and  summer  of  191 6,  the  British  undertook 
to  clear  Egyptian  territory,  i.  e.,  the  Isthmus  and 
the  Peninsula,  of  the  enemy.  They  did  not  get  the 
revenge  they  longed  for,  the  chance  to  meet  the 
Turks  when  the  tables,  as  far  as  geographical  ad- 
vantages were  concerned,  were  turned  in  British 
favor. 

The  failure  of  the  Turks  to  accomplish  anything 
against  Egypt  counterbalanced  the  effect  in  |Egypt 
of  Gallipoli  and  Mesopotamia.  The  mass  of  the 
Egyptians  would  have  welcomed  Turks  and  Ger- 
mans, had  they  invaded  Egypt  after  a  successful 
battle  with  the  British  forces.  .  But  they  would 
have  risked  nothing  until  they  were  certain  of  the 
success  of  the  invaders.  Under  no  circumstances 
would  the  Egyptians  have  risked  an  uprising  against 
the  British.  The  internal  security  of  Egypt  depends 
upon  the  defense  of  the  Canal. 

The  present  war  was  needed  to  convince  the  Brit- 
ish nation  and  the  British  dominions  overseas  of  the 
necessity  of  making  Egypt  a  permanent  British 
possession.  The  Suez  Canal  is  the  artery  binding 
India  and  Australasia  to  the  Mother  Country,  and 
it  was  fitting  that  Indians  and  Australians  and  New 
Zealanders  should  have  an  important  part  in  its 

432 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


defense.  What  would  have  happened  had  Britain 
yielded  during  the  past  thirty  years  to  the  insistent 
demands  (the  demands  of  some  of  her  own  states- 
men) to  evacuate  Egypt?  After  the  lesson  of  this 
war,  only  the  Britisher,  who  is  a  Little  Englander 
and  who  wants  to  see  the  Empire  disbanded,  will 
argue  for  giving  up  Egypt. 

The  attack  on  the  Suez  Canal  made  clear  the 
destiny  of  Egypt,  if  Britain  emerges  from  the  war 
the  victor.  I  did  not  hesitate  to  ask  the  Sultan 
what  he  expected  would  be  Britain's  attitude  towards 
maintaining  the  Protectorate  after  the  war.  His 
answer  was  frank  and  unhesitating.  "You  need 
only  to  look  at  the  British  troops  in  Egypt,  and  to 
consider  where  they  came  from,"  said  His  Highness, 
"to  realize  how  splendidly  this  war  is  proving  the 
solidarity  of  the  British  Empire,  and  the  importance 
of  the  Suez  Canal  to  the  British  Empire.  After  the 
war,  when  Britain  has  demonstrated  that  she  could 
hold  by  countless  sacrifice  of  blood  and  treasure,  in 
which  the  colonies  fully  cooperated,  her  great  Empire 
intact,  it  is  unlikely  that  the  Suez  Canal  and  Egypt 
will  be  less  necessary  to  England  than  now  or  than 
before  the  war.  I  should  not  have  accepted  the 
Sultanate  under  British  protection,  had  I  not  been 
loyal  to,  and  sympathetic  with,  those  whom  long 
and  intimate  experience  have  taught  me  are  the 
true  friends  of  my  people  and  of  my  family.  I 
have  consented  to  work,  at  the  age  of  sixty-four, 
with  the  English  for  the  regeneration  of  my  coun- 
try, and  for  the  fulfillment  of  the  wonderful 
dreams  for  Egypt  and  her  people  that  have  come 
^8  433 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  me  from  my  august  ancestor,  the  founder  of  my 
House."' 

Success  in  securing  a  riiler  from  the  khedivial 
family,  and  in  keeping  the  country  quiet  during  the 
trying  periods  of  the  beginning  of  the  war,  the  Turk- 
ish attacks  on  the  Canal,  the  Senussi  raids,  and  the 
Gallipoli  and  Mesopotamia  fiascoes,  must  not  be 
interpreted  by  the  British,  however,  as  a  sign  of  the 
loyalty  of  the  Egyptians  to  the  Protectorate  and  of 
their  satisfaction  with  the  past  and  present  of  British 
rule.  I  do  not  know  what  Egyptians  may  say  to 
British  friends  and  British  journalists.  It  is  prob- 
able that  they  are  especially  guarded  in  their  obser- 
vations during  war  time.  But  they  have  spoken 
out  of  their  heart  to  me.  Without  a  single  exception, 
Christians  as  well  as  Moslems,  from  extreme  Anglo- 
philes to  extreme  Anglophobes,  the  Egyptians  are 
dissatisfied  with  the  way  in  which  British  rvle  has 
developed  in  Egypt,  and  sincerely  and  ardently 
desire  a  change.  Sultan,  Prime  Minister,  Cabinet, 
and  notables,  are  at  one  in  their  demand  that  Egypt 
should  have — and  have  immediately — a  very  much 
larger  measure  of  self-government  than  has  been 
allowed  to  her  during  the  past. 

In  1 91 6,  I  noticed  many  changes  from  the  Egypt 
of  1909,  when  Young  Turks,  Young  Persians,  and 
Young  Egyptians  had  high  hopes  of  establishing  a 
constitutional  regime  in  Moslem  countries.  There 

'  This  interview  in  full,  which  was  passed  for  publication  by  His 
Highness,  was  published  in  my  correspondence  to  the  New  York 
and  Paris  editions  of  the  New  York  Herald  and  the  Philadelphia 
Evening  Telegraph,  January  to  March,  1916. 

434 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


is  a  difference  of  attitude  toward  many  problems 
affecting  national  life:  disillusionment  in  political 
matters;  sadness  in  educational  matters.  But  on 
one  point  there  is  no  change.  The  opinion  is  exactly 
the  same.  The  Egyptians  resent  the  pretension  of 
the  British  to  manage  their  internal  affairs  for  them. 
They  want  to  get  rid  of  the  officials  who  have  in- 
stalled themselves,  not  always  tactfully,  in  the 
ministries  as  masters  in  every  branch  of  administra- 
tion. They  are  like  every  other  nation  in  the  world 
in  wanting  to  run  their  own  affairs.  They  grant 
that  they  may  run  them  badly  for  a  while.  But 
their  argument  is  unanswerable.  They  ask  you  to 
point  out  a  single  nation  in  history  that  has  evolved 
into  a  self-governing  community  without  having 
gone  through  a  long  period  of  imperfection,  mistakes, 
and  errors,  even  of  revolution  and  anarchy.  The 
Egyptians  have  three  serious  charges  against  the 
system  of  ruling  Egypt  which  Lord  Cromer  laid 
down.  The  impartial  observer,  with  the  facts 
before  him,  admits  that  these  charges  are  amply 
substantiated. 

I.  The  British  officials  in  Egypt  do  not  put  first 
the  interests  of  the  country  in  which  they  are  living, 
from  which  they  draw  their  salaries,  and  whose  Sultan 
they  are  supposed  to  be  serving. 

The  system  of  having  the  internal  affairs  of  a  na- 
tion managed  by  men  whose  allegiance  is  to  the  sover- 
eign of  another  nation  and  who  take  their  orders,  not 
from  the  Sultan  and  his  Cabinet,  but  from  a  foreign 
official,  is  pernicious  in  the  extreme,  and  bound  to 
have  disastrous  results  in  the  long  run.    Until  it  is 

435 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


changed,  no  reasonable  man  can  blame  the  Egyptians 
for  saying  that  they  are  in  the  position  of  a  conquered 
race,  held  in  bondage  by  force.  Their  masters  may 
take  care  of  them  in  the  best  way  possible,  looking 
after  their  subjects'  interests,  and  giving  them  bene- 
fits that  they  would  not  have  if  they  looked  after 
their  own  interests.  But  they  are  in  bondage  all  the 
same.  Is  it  not  an  Anglo-Saxon  maxim  that  just 
government  derives  its  authority  from  the  consent  of 
the  governed? 

2.  The  British  officials  do  not  feel  and  care  for 
Egypt  and  the  Egyptians  as  it  is  essential  they  should 
feel  and  care  to  fill  properly  their  positions. 

The  great  majority  of  the  officials  have  no  interest 
in  the  "natives."  They  dislike  them,  and  speak 
disparagingly  of  them.  They  tell  you  frankly  .that 
their  motive  for  being  in  Egypt  is  to  serve  British 
interests  and  draw  their  pay.  They  resent  the  fact 
that  they  are  disliked,  although  they  make  little 
effort  to  be  liked ;  are  impatient  with  the  folly  of  the 
natives  for  not  knowing  a  good  thing  (the  British 
administration)  when  they  see  it;  and  are  angry  at 
what  they  term  Egyptian  ingratitude.  The  few  who 
have  given  their  lives  to  Egypt,  and  have  actually 
shown  proof  of  self-sacrifice  and  devotion,  are 
grieved  over  the  lack  of  appreciation  they  receive 
from  the  people.  It  is  hard  to  get  under  the  skin  of 
a  Britisher.  He  feels  that  he  is  a  superior  being. 
As  he  is  wholly  indifferent  about  your  attitude  to- 
wards him  he  never  bothers  his  head  about  what 
you  are  thinking  of  him.  Other  nations  frequently 
speak  of  a  British  attitude  as  "  deliberately  insulting. " 

436 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


That  is  not  true.  It  is  farthest  from  the  British 
mind  to  be  insulting.  The  action  in  question  is 
instinctive — not  thought  out  or  willed.  An  English- 
man of  the  upper  class  would  be  the  most  surprised 
man  in  the  world  if  he  discovered  that  you  thought  he 
was  not  acting  considerately  and  courteously.  There 
is  no  more  charming  thoroughbred  in  the  world  than 
the  English  gentleman — to  those  whom  he  knows. 
Those  whom  he  does  not  know  are  nonentities  to  him, 
and  if  he  were  to  think  the  matter  out,  he  would 
arrive  at  the  conclusion  that  he  does  not  see  why  he  is 
not  a  nonentity  to  them  also.  The  reasoning  is  this : 
he  does  not  bother  me.    Why  should  I  bother  him? 

One  afternoon  in  Shepheard's  Hotel,  an  officer  who 
belonged  to  a  London  regiment  and  whose  accent 
was  South  England  to  perfection,  was  disconcerted 
and  provoked  when  I  asked  him  a  question  about 
Melbourne.  "How  did  you  know  that  I  was  an 
Australian?"  he  asked.  "By  the  way  you  walked 
through  the  hall,"  I  answered.  "You  looked  at 
people  with  evident  interest  as  you  came  toward  me. 
Had  your  Oxford  accent  been  innate  and  not  acquired 
you  would  have  seen  no  one  in  the  hall."  The 
British  official  in  the  African  colonics  is  generally  a 
gentleman,  with  the  temperamental  limitations  of  his 
class.  He  voices  the  mental  attitude  of  Great  Bri- 
tain in  her  dealings  with  other  nations.  He  never 
considers  for  one  moment  the  fact  that  other  in- 
dividuals than  himself,  and  other  races  than  his  own, 
have,  and  have  a  right  to,  amour  propre. 

With  untutored  savages  and  with  peasants,  the 
British  attitude  goes.    Only  when  there  is  the  ele- 

437 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ment  of  injustice — as  at  Denshawai — do  the  unedu- 
cated classes  rebel  against  it.  But  the  upper  class 
Egyptians,  who  have  blood  and  traditions  and  educa- 
tion, hate  like  poison  the  way  most  Englishmen 
treat  them.  They  tell  me  that  they  do  not  blame  the 
Englishman  for  his  views  and  his  temperament. 
But  they  do  blame  him  for  forcing  those  views  and 
that  temperament  upon  them  in  their  own  country. 

3.  As  the  civil  service  has  developed,  the  British 
Government  has  not  been  able  to  send  a  uniformly  high 
class  of  officials  to  Egypt.  The  Egyptians  are  made  to 
accept  in  many  official  positions  men  whose  mental 
caliber  would  not  enable  them  to  fill  similar  positions 
in  Great  Britain. 

This  is  undoubtedly  true.  I  have  seen  numerous 
examples  of  it.  The  Egyptian  civil  service  has  in  it 
many  splendid  men.  But  there  are  others  who  are 
decidedly  second  rate.  The  Egyptians  are  very 
quick  to  recognize  the  second-rate  man.  If  a  man 
has  marked  ability  and  splendid  training,  or  is  a 
thoroughbred,  and  if  there  is  confidence  in  his  in- 
tegrity and  in  his  sense  of  justice,  respect  and  even 
admiration  will  be  given  to  him.  He  may  be  dis- 
liked; but  his  authority  will  be  acknowledged.  It  is 
a  lamentable  injustice  and  abuse  of  power,  however, 
to  put  over  a  weaker  nation,  in  positions  of  superior 
authority,  men  whose  judgment  and  training  are 
inferior  to  those  to  whom  they  give  orders.  There 
is  a  striking  case  of  this  at  the  present  time  in  one 
of  the  Egyptian  ministries.  The  adviser  in  question 
has  many  warm  supporters  among  the  British  in 
Egypt,  but,  when  I  put  the  question  straight,  I 

438 


EGYPT  A  BRITISH  PROTECTORATE 


never  found  one  who  would  not  admit  that  in  Eng- 
land this  adviser  could  not  possibly  obtain  a  position 
such  as  the  one  in  which  the  Egyptians  are  compelled 
to  defer  to  his  judgment  and  his  decisions.  And  it  is 
a  position  second  to  none,  from  the  Egyptian  stand- 
point, in  importance  in  uplifting  their  nation! 

I  have  tried  to  show  in  this  volume  how  much  the 
British  Empire  owes  to  the  class  of  men  England,  of 
all  nations,  is  alone  able  to  send  abroad  in  great 
number  for  colonial  military  and  administrative 
positions.  But  the  supply,  as  the  case  of  Egypt 
shows,  was  not  unlimited  before  the  war.  It  is  un- 
fortunately the  very  class  that  has  suffered  most 
heavily  during  the  past  two  years.  The  British 
Government  cannot  hope  to  replace  soon  the  men 
who  have  fallen  in  Flanders,  Gallipoli,  and  Meso- 
potamia. 

It  would  seem  to  the  outside  observer,  then,  not 
only  that  the  British  should  be  very  slow  to  assume 
new  and  extensive  colonial  responsibilities,  but  also 
that  they  should  endeavor,  wherever  possible,  to 
retrench  in  the  using  of  the  best  element  of  the 
British  nation.  Never  has  there  been  a  demand  far 
in  excess  of  the  supply,  because  the  upper  class  has 
placed  self-imposed  restrictions  upon  its  field  of 
activity.  A  new  condition  will  confront  the  British 
Government  after  the  war. 

My  space  is  too  limited  to  discuss  the  international 
problem  that  Great  Britain  has  to  face  in  regularizing 
her  position  in  Egypt.  Since  fifteen  Governments 
have  by  treaty  a  privileged  position  in  Egypt,  it  will 
be  necessary  to  treat  with  them  all  to  secure  their 

439 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


consent  to  the  abolition  of  the  capitulations  and  to 
the  establishment  of  the  Protectorate.  The  negotia- 
tions to  this  end  may  demand  in  some  cases  the  offer- 
ing of  compensations.  But  they  ought  not  to  be 
difficult.  British  administration  of  justice,  British 
handling  of  finances,  and  British  principles  of  equal 
tariffs  and  the  open  door  are  sufficient  guarantee  that 
the  new  status  quo,  far  from  injuring  foreign  residents 
or  merchants,  will  be  distinctly  to  their  advantage. 

The  great  problem  is  that  of  the  internal  govern- 
ment of  Egypt.  Great  Britain  will  have  the  acquies- 
cence and  support  of  the  Egyptians  in  leaving  in  her 
hands  entirely  the  foreign  relations  of  Egypt  and  all 
matters  relating  to  the  Canal  and  to  the  zone  between 
the  Canal  and  the  Ottoman  Empire.  For  it  is  freely 
recognized  by  all  that  British  Imperial  interests 
demand,  and  have  a  right  to  demand,  that  the  Suez 
Canal  be  under  British  control.  But  no  Egyptians, 
as  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  ascertain,  are  going  to 
support  the  present  humiliating  system  of  internal 
administration.  Since  they  are  unable  to  overthrow 
it,  they  may  have  to  continue  to  tolerate  it.  One 
hopes,  however,  that  British  statesmen  will  see  that 
the  interest  of  the  Empire  is  best  served  by  letting 
the  Egyptians  have  the  same  chance  that  their  own 
forebears  had  of  working  out  political  salvation. 


440 


CHAPTER  XXII 


THE  CREATION  OF  THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN 
UNION 

/^"^  NE  summer  afternoon,  when  I  was  indulging 


in  my  favorite  recreation  of  rummaging  in 


the  stalls  of  the  second-hand  booksellers  along 
the  Seine  quays  in  Paris,  I  came  across  a  little  duo- 
decimo volume  of  less  than  three  hundred  pages, 
which  bore  the  title:  Woman,  Her  Past,  Her  Present, 
and  Her  Future.  Even  to  an  eighteenth-century 
author,  who  lived  long  before  the  days  of  feminism, 
the  project  of  telUng  all  about  women  in  one  little 
book  must  have  appeared  ambitious,  unless  he  were 
a  bachelor  or  a  monk.  I  was  amused  at  the  temerity 
or  ignorance  of  the  writer.  I  feel  that  I  am  laying 
myself  open  to  a  similar  criticism  in  trying  to  discuss 
the  South  African  Union  in  one  small  chapter  of  a 
book  covering  all  of  Africa.  But  some  mention  must 
be  made,  even  if  it  be  of  an  incomplete  and  summary 
character,  of  the  formation  of  a  great  European  state 
out  of  territories  colonized  by  white  men.  Only  in 
South  Africa  has  Europe  been  able  to  become  in- 
digenous, racially  and  politically. 

In  his  farewell  speech,  when  he  resigned  the  High 
Commissionership  of  the  South  African  colonies, 


441 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Lord  Milner  called  upon  the  people  to  be  faithful  to 
the  idea  of  imperial  unity,  which  alone  would  solve 
the  most  difficult  and  persistent  problem  of  South 
Africa.  "The  Dutch  can  never  own  perfect  al- 
legiance to  Great  Britain,"  he  said,  "but  the  British 
and  Dutch  alike  can  unite  in  loyal  devotion  to  an 
Empire  state  in  which  Britain  and  South  Africa  are 
partners.  The  true  Imperialist  is  also  the  best 
South  African."  These  remarkable  words,  uttered 
by  a  man  who  never  failed  to  see  clearly  into  the 
heart  of  a  problem,  expressed  the  conviction  that 
came  to  moderate  Dutch  and  moderate  British 
after  the  Transvaal  and  the  Orange  Free  State  were 
granted  responsible  government. 

The  work  of  the  Colonial  Convention,  assembled  to 
agree  upon  the  form  of  union  and  the  constitution, 
extended  over  eighteen  months.  There  were  many 
particular  interests  to  be  considered,  and  several 
crises  arose,  which  threatened  to  wreck  the  project 
altogether.  Both  Natal  and  the  Transvaal  showed 
an  uncompromising  spirit,  and  a  perfect  willingness 
to  refuse  to  come  in,  if  what  they  called  their  rights 
and  interests  were  not  taken  into  account.  Cape 
Colony  had  a  negro  franchise.  The  Orange  Free 
State,  being  very  markedly  Boer,  held  out  on  the  educa- 
tion question.  In  the  end,  however,  the  four  colonies 
were  able  to  agree.  Their  decision  was  hastened  by 
the  railway  question  and  the  tariff  war,  of  which 
we  have  spoken  in  a  previous  chapter.  Rhodesia 
stayed  out.  The  conditions  of  union  were  formu- 
lated by  the  colonies  themselves,  and  presented  to 
the  Home  Government  merely  for  sanction,  and  not 

442 


THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  UNION 


for  decision  or  revision.  All  these  conditions,  except 
the  question  of  the  inclusion  of  the  native  protecto- 
rates, were  sine  qua  non.  This  was  clearly  impressed 
upon  the  Imperial  Parliament,  when  the  Bill  for 
union  was  presented.  Delegates  representing  the 
different  elements  and  parties  in  South  Africa  were 
present  in  the  House  of  Lords  and  the  House  of 
Commons  when  the  Bill  was  read.  Some  of  the  provi- 
sions were  distasteful  to  Parliament.  Opposition  was 
strong,  however,  only  against  the  provision  which  ex- 
cluded from  the  Union  Parliament  and  governing  func- 
tions persons  who  were  not  "of  European  descent." 
Only  because  the  Imperial  Parliament  was  given 
clearly  to  understand  that  striking  out  this  provision 
would  wreck  the  Union  were  the  Liberals  induced  to 
allow  it  to  stand.  The  native  franchise  stood  for  the 
province  of  Cape  Colony.  But  even  that  could  be 
taken  away  by  two-thirds  vote  of  the  Commonwealth 
Parliament.  As  changes  in  the  constitution  were 
subject  to  the  veto  of  the  King,  the  Radicals  were 
persuaded  that  this  franchise  was  not  in  jeopardy. 
The  "Union  of  South  Africa"  was  formed  by  Royal 
Proclamation  on  December  2,  1909,  and  Herbert 
Gladstone,  raised  to  the  peerage,  was  appointed  as 
first  Governor. 

From  this  moment,  South  Africa  became  a  self- 
governing  dominion  of  the  British  Empire,  like 
Canada,  Australia,  and  New  Zealand.  Direct  author- 
ity of  the  Crown  remained  only  in  the  protectorates, 
of  which  we  have  spoken  previously;  but  they  were 
eventually  to  be  transferred  to  the  Union.  Seven 
years  after  the  close  of  the  Boer  War,  Boer  and  Briton 

443 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


were  united  in  a  common  effort,  with  common 
privileges  and  responsibilities,  to  work  out  the  desti- 
nies of  European  civilization  in  South  Africa.  The 
Union  is  the  most  remarkable  achievement  of 
British  statesmanship  in  the  history  of  the  Empire. 
It  was  possible  only  because  the  Home  Government 
had  the  courage  to  grant  responsible  government  to 
the  former  Boer  repubHcs,  and  the  wisdom  to  refuse 
to  override  the  decisions  of  the  colonies  in  regard  to 
their  particular  interests  and  their  common  interests. 
It  proves  the  peculiar  genius  of  Anglo-Saxondom 
for  creating  and  fostering  democratic  institutions. 
The  British  are  very  far  from  being  democrats  from 
the  social  point  of  view.  Politically,  they  have  estab- 
lished the  only  real  democracy  that  exists  in  the 
world  to-day. 

One  finds  everywhere  in  Africa  a  refutation  of  the 
argument  so  often  heard  in  the  United  States  against 
government  ownership  of  railways.  Great  financial 
benefit  has  come  to  almost  every  European  colony 
in  Africa  where  the  Government  has  from  the  begin- 
ning exploited  the  railways,  or  has  later  taken  them 
over  from  private  corporations.  Especially  is  this 
true  in  South  Africa.  Cape  Colony  and  Natal,  as 
well  as  the  two  Dutch  republics,  own  their  railways. 
When  the  Union  was  formed,  common  state  owner- 
ship and  state  management  was  instituted  without 
a  hitch.  There  were  no  private  interests,  influencing 
legislators,  to  be  considered.  The  South  African 
railways  are  free  from  concessions.  Even  the  re- 
freshment privilege,  which  used  to  be  farmed  out, 
has  been  taken  over  by  the  State.    Capital  for  rail- 

444 


THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  UNION 

way  construction  is  raised  by  increase  of  the  state 
debt,  and  purely  public  considerations  dictate  rail- 
way extension.  Not  only  are  the  railways  in  the 
South  African  Union  self-supporting,  as  in  the  Sudan 
and  almost  everywhere  else  in  Africa ;  but  after  inter- 
est charges  on  the  capital  invested  and  expenses  of 
management  are  paid,  the  State  has  a  very  large 
surplus  for  the  purposes  of  the  general  budget.  A 
study  of  the  statistics  of  the  various  Unes  reveals  the 
advantage  of  the  common  wealth  to  the  Common- 
wealth. The  Cape  and  Free  State  railways  are  run 
at  a  loss.  The  coal  and  Rand  lines  of  the  Transvaal 
pay  the  deficit.  This  enables  the  State  to  maintain 
existing  and  to  develop  new  lines  on  a  sound  eco- 
nomic basis.  When  the  cotmtry  that  is  being  opened 
up  by  the  railways  is  developed,  the  new  lines  will 
become  self-supporting,  and  the  financial  advantage 
will  accrue  to  the  State,  Some  of  them,  whose  con- 
struction was  dictated  in  the  beginning  by  political 
considerations,  would  have  been  built  by  private 
capital  only  under  conditions  that  would  later  have 
proved  onerous  to  the  State.  As  it  is,  the  people 
will  possess  the  values  they  have  themselves  created. 
Inhabitants  of  the  Transvaal,  who  view  the  railway 
question  from  a  selfish  local  point  of  view,  complain 
that  they  are  being  mulcted  to  afford  the  Cape 
Colony  and  Free  State  people  the  luxury  of  better 
railway  service  than  their  present  resources  and 
earning  capacity  give  them  the  right  to  expect.  If 
living  were  only  from  day  to  day,  the  complaint 
would  be  just.  But  the  Transvaal  enjoys  re>.'iprocal 
advantages  from  its  membership  in  the  Union. 

445 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


There  is  unhampered  access  to  the  sea  for  the  land- 
locked colony.  Food  products,  wood,  and  other 
materials  necessary  for  the  Transvaal's  development 
are  received  without  the  duties  that  might  have  been 
imposed,  had  the  members  of  the  Union  continued 
their  separate  existence. 

Since  the  union.  South  Africa  has  not  made  much 
progress  in  solving  the  negro  question.  Between  the 
census  of  1904  and  191 1,  the  native  population  in- 
creased more  rapidly  than  the  white.  The  Euro- 
peans passed  from  1,117,000  to  1,276,000;  natives 
from  4,059,000  to  4,697,000.  If  the  protectorates 
had  been  included,  the  proportion  of  whites  to  blacks 
in  South  Africa  would  have  been  less  than  fifteen 
per  cent.  Without  the  protectorates,  it  is  scarcely 
more  than  twenty  per  cent.  The  policy  advocated 
by  General  Hertzog  and  a  large  portion  of  the 
Afrikanders  to  establish  distinct  zones  of  settlement 
for  natives,  wholly  aside  from  the  formidable  storm 
of  protest  that  would  have  greeted  such  a  measure  in 
England,  was  hardly  a  practicable  suggestion.  The 
Crown  lands,  though  large  in  extent,  are  mostly 
barren  and  far  from  railways.  A  bill  to  segregate 
the  blacks  in  this  way  was  presented  to  the  Union 
ParUament  in  1914.  It  had  the  weakness  of  all 
attempts  on  the  part  of  white  men  to  "give"  natives 
a  portion  of  what  they  have  taken  from  them. 
It  failed  to  provide  either  sufBcient  land  or  the  right 
sort  of  land,  and  would  have  been  as  crying  an  in- 
justice as  the  disgraceful — I  might  better  say  con- 
temptible— Indian  reservation  bills  of  the  United 
States.    It  was  also  open  to  the  grave  suspicion  of 

446 


THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  UNION 

being  a  measure  inspired  by  the  Boer  farmers  to  get 
cheap  labor:  for  had  the  bill  passed,  the  blacks  of 
many  regions,  especially  in  the  Orange  River,  would 
have  been  at  the  mercy  of  the  farmers.  The  supply 
of  mining  and  agricultural  labor  in  other  parts  of  the 
Union  would  have  been  depleted.  From  the  point 
of  view  of  safety,  also,  segregation  of  natives  seems 
unwise  in  a  country  where  they  are  in  so  great  a 
numerical  superiority  to  colonists  and  increasing 
more  rapidly  than  colonists.  One  feels  that  the 
South  Africans  are  safe  without  having  to  keep  on 
foot  a  large  military  and  police  force  only  because 
the  blacks  are  scattered. ' 

I  The  negro  problem  in  South  Africa  is  unforttmately 
developing  in  the  same  way  that  it  has  developed  in 
the  American  Southern  States.  With  the  advance  of 
civilization  and  the  disappearance  of  slavery,  giving 
to  the  blacks  freedom  of  movement  and  the  right  to 
vote,  social  antagonism,  with  its  evils  and  its  dis- 
tressing manifestations,  has  arisen.  When  negroes 
come  into  the  enjoyment  of  economic  and  political 
equality,  they  feel  keenly  the  withholding  of  the 
social  equality  that  it  is  not  in  the  nature  of  the  white 
man  to  grant.  The  advocacy  of  segregation  on  a 
wholesale  scale  is  the  logical  development  of  local 
segregation.  Custom,  sanctioned  by  law,  enforces 
separate  transportation  facilities,  separate  schools, 
separate  residence  quarters,  separate  hotels,  and  sepa- 
rate restaurants.    To  the  educated  and  refined 

j  negroes,  travel  is  hell.    How  can  they  help  suffering 

'  Rhodesia  was  very  hostile  to  this  bill,  fearing  its  passage  would 
result  in  a  wholesale  exodus  northward  of  blaeks  and  poor  whites. 

447 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


from  being  made  pariahs?  Others,  who  through  no 
fault  of  their  own  have  not  white  blood  in  their  veins, 
are  driven  by  their  social  ostracism  to  become 
criminals.  When  one  studies  this  problem  from  the 
psychological  point  of  view,  the  frequency  of  the 
unspeakable  crime  is  not  surprising.  Adequate  pro- 
tection of  the  white  woman  is  the  nightmare  of  South 
Africa  fully  as  much  as  of  the  American  Southern 
States.  When  Lord  Gladstone  revised  the  death 
sentence  in  a  Rhodesian  rape  case,  he  found  that 
white  men  who  lived  in  communities  where  they  were 
outnumbered  or  equalled  by  negroes  would  never 
admit  the  possibility  of  extenuating  circumstances  in 
a  crime  of  this  sort.  His  ignorance  or  lack  of  appre- 
ciation of  local  conditions  led  him  to  commit  an 
unpardonable  blunder.  There  was  a  howl  of  in- 
dignation from  one  end  of  South  Africa  to  the 
other. 

European  civilization  has  brought  also  to  South 
Africa  the  war  between  capital  and  labor,  which  has 
developed  in  exactly  the  same  way  as  in  all  states 
where  there  is  universal  manhood  suffrage.  As  we 
have  explained  in  describing  the  problems  of  South 
Africa  before  the  union,  the  early  days  of  the  labor 
movement  on  the  Rand  were  not  very  successful,  be- 
cause there  was  no  unemployment,  and  because  the 
native  labor  question,  with  its  social  side,  complicated 
the  problem.  Later,  the  white  men  engaged  in  min- 
ing grew  to  the  number  of  nearly  fifty  thousand,  and 
there  were  a  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  European 
industrial  workers  scattered  throughout  the  Union, 
The  emigrants  to  the  Transvaal  from  England  were 

448 


THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  UNION 


almost  all  of  them  strong  trades-union  men,  and 
brought  their  ideas  and  their  propaganda  with  them, 
although  British  imperialism,  even  in  the  new  country, 
was  anathema  to  them.  They  fraternized  with  the 
Boers  who  had  drifted  from  the  farms  to  the  cities.  In- 
ternational socialism  took  no  account  of  racial  antago- 
nism between  Briton  and  Boer.  In  the  last  general 
election  the  Labor  party  returned  four  members  to 
the  Union  Parliament.  There  have  been  strikes  in 
South  Africa,  and  very  serious  labor  riots.  The 
police  and  military  had  to  be  called  out  in  Johannes- 
burg in  1 913,  and  there  was  street  fighting  that  re- 
sulted in  considerable  loss  of  life.  Seventy  per  cent, 
of  the  rioters  were  Afrikanders,  but  all  the  leaders 
were  English.  Most  of  them,  like  Bain  and  Crawford, 
had  been  in  America,  and  brought  to  the  solution  of 
South  African  labor  problems  methods  they  learned 
in  Colorado  and  West  Virginia. 

From  the  first  days  of  the  Union,  General  Botha 
has  been  the  commanding  figure  in  South  Africa, 
and  General  Smuts  has  been  the  loyal  coadjutor  of 
General  Botha.  The  Boers  formed  a  majority  of 
the  electorate  in  the  Cape,  the  Orange  Free  State, 
and  the  Transvaal.  They  form  a  majority  of  the 
electorate  in  the  Union.  It  is  clear,  then,  that  from 
the  moment  the  Boer  War  disenfranchisements  were 
terminated  in  the  Cape,  and  the  two  former  republics 
were  granted  self-government,  there  was  no  hope  of 
an  imperial  policy  except  by  the  aid  of  the  Boers 
themselves.  Had  the  Boers  all  been  recalcitrant  and 
unwilling  to  consider  that  they  had  anything  to  give 
to  or  receive  from  the  British  Empire,  sclf-govcrn- 
29  449 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ment  would  inevitably  have  led  to  civil  war  and  the 
revoking  of  the  constitutions,  or  complete  separation 
from  Great  Britain. '  But  General  Botha  as  Premier 
of  the  Transvaal,  and  Mr.  Merriman  as  Premier  of 
the  Cape  Colony,  formed  Boer  parties  that  were 
favorable  to  a  South  African  Union  under  the  British 
flag,  and  to  reconciliation  with  the  British  element 
in  the  colonies. 

Lord  Gladstone  offered  General  Botha  the  premier- 
ship of  the  Union  of  South  Africa  until  a  general  election 
could  be  held.  A  coalition  ministry  was  proposed, 
with  the  inclusion  of  Dr.  Jameson  and  some  of  the 
British  party,  but  General  Botha  was  keen  enough  to 
realize  that  if  he  took  the  English  into  his  bosom,  he 
would  estrange  much  of  the  Boer  support  he  needed 
to  carry  out  the  reconciliation  program  he  had  in  mind. 
So  he  made  General  Smuts  Minister  of  the  Interior, 
and  included  General  Hertzog,  who  represented  the 
extreme  Boer  party  of  the  Orange  Free  State.  Gen- 
eral Botha  stated  that  his  program  would  be:  the 
unification  of  the  white  population,  sympathetic 
treatment  of  natives  and  colored  persons,  the  preven- 

'  The  Dutch  Reformed  Church  has  a  membership  of  nearly  seven 
hundred  thousand,  more  than  half  the  total  population  of  European 
descent  in  South  Africa  and  Rhodesia  combined.  The  ofificial 
census  figures  of  1904  and  191 1  show  that  the  population  of  the  Orange 
Free  State  increased  more  than  five  times  as  fast  as  the  population 
of  Cape  Colony  and  Natal.  The  Transvaal  increased  over  four 
times  as  fast.  The  Boers  have  much  larger  families  than  the  British. 
Their  distribution,  also,  is  stronger.  They  are  not  congregated  in 
cities.  They  have  lands  and  permanent  sources  of  wealth.  Unfor- 
tunately, the  alarmingly  large  class  of  "poor  whites"  has  a  large 
Anglo-Saxon  element  in  it. 


THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  UNION 


tion  of  Asiatic  immigration,  a  broad  and  conciliatory 
educational  policy,  and  everything  that  would  tend 
to  a  rapid  economic  development. 

In  the  general  election  on  September  15,  1910, 
General  Botha's  Nationalist  party,  comprised  wholly 
of  Boers,  carried  67  out  of  121  seats.  So  he  had 
a  majority  over  the  British,  the  irreconcilable 
Boers,  and  the  labor  members  combined.  We  can- 
not go  into  the  political  history  of  the  next  few  years. 
General  Botha  was  greatly  helped  in  keeping  down 
racial  animosity  by  the  splendid  attitude  of  Dr. 
Jameson,  who  had  the  political  wisdom  and  the 
patriotism  to  continue  to  support  unwaveringly 
General  Botha  after  the  coalition  ministry  project 
was  refused  by  Botha.  Dr.  Jameson  had  to  resist 
the  pressure  of  his  political  friends,  and  to  stand  the 
criticism  of  the  British  section  of  the  press.  It  is 
not  too  much  to  say  that  Dr.  Jameson's  policy  was 
almost  as -important  a  factor  in  making  the  Union 
successful  as  General  Botha's.  These  two  men  were 
imbued  with  the  spirit  of  "live  and  let  live. "  They 
had  rare  moral  courage  in  the  midst  of  the  passion 
and  prejudice  and  blindness  of  many  of  their  political 
associates. 

In  1913,  the  split  that  had  long  been  expected 
among  the  Boers  was  made  definite  by  the  with- 
drawal of  General  Hertzog  from  the  Botha  Minis- 
try. A  new  party  was  formed,  which  called  itself 
the  National  party.  General  Botha's  moderate 
Boers  preferred  the  title  of  South  African  party. 
Although  General  Hertzog,  who  was  at  one  time  a 
judge  in  the  Free  State,  has  always  remained  a  fanati- 

451 

I 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


cal  Afrikander  and  has  never  abandoned  the  early 
Krugerism  in  his  attitude  toward  the  uitlanders,  he 
has  unconsciously — perhaps  involuntarily — devel- 
oped by  his  intimate  contact  with  the  English  social 
graces  and  a  breadth  of  vision.  It  is  impossible  to 
believe  that  his  fanatical  opposition  to  the  imperial 
deal  reflects  his  own  sober  judgment.  The  benefit 
that  South  Africa  receives  from  British  sovereignty, 
the  inevitable  triumph  of  English  over  Taal,  and  the 
impossibility  of  reviving  the  old  pastoral  simpHcity 
of  Boer  life  must  certainly  be  realized  by  a  m.an  of  his 
keen  intellectual  gifts.  What  one  honestly  believes, 
and  the  position  one  assumes  in  public  for  sentimental 
and  poHtical  reasons,  are  often  radically  different. 
General  Hertzog,  unlike  General  Christian  De  Wet, 
did  not  involve  himself  in  the  rebellion  of  1914. 
But  he  was  outspoken  in  his  opposition  to  a  South 
African  campaign  against  the  German  colonies,  to 
the  Enemy  Trading  Bill,  and  to  proposals  to  interne 
German  subjects  in  the  Union  and  put  their  property 
under  sequestration. 

In  the  general  election  of  191 5,  General  Botha  lost 
thirteen  seats,  and  continues  to  hold  office  only  by 
the  support  of  the  British  party.  The  political  situa- 
tion is  very  much  involved  at  present,  owing  to  the 
unusual  external  and  internal  problems  aroused  by 
the  war.  At  present,  General  Botha  is  between  two 
fires.  Many  Boers  believe  that  he  is  too  British,  and 
is  sacrificing  the  interests  of  South  Africa  to  those  of 
a  decadent  and  disappearing  Empire.  Most  of  the 
British  tell  him  that  he  has  not  the  backbone  to  be 
loyal  in  the  sense  they  have  of  that  word.  Recently, 

452 


THE  SOUTH  AFRICAN  UNION 


in  desperation,  when  he  was  being  pressed  to  disre- 
gard the  Boer  opposition  to  the  measure  to  increase 
the  pay  given  to  South  African  contingents  in  the 
Imperial  army,  General  Botha  turned  to  the  British 
members  of  his  Parliament,  and  cried,  "You  ought 
not  to  press  me!  You  know  I  am  standing  on 
the  brink  of  a  volcano. "  If  they  have  any  sense,  the 
British  in  South  Africa  will  not  press  too  hard  the 
man  to  whom  they  owe  the  fact  that  their  flag  is 
still  waving  throughout  the  Union. 


453 


CHAPTER  XXIII 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA  AND 
ITS  AFTERMATH 

AT  a  special  session  of  the  Union  Parliament  on 
September  14,  1914,  a  resolution  was  passed 
by  ninety-two  to  twelve  declaring  that  the 
House  was  whole-heartedly  determined  "to  take  all 
measures  necessary  for  defending  the  interests  of 
the  Union  and  for  cooperating  with  his  Majesty's 
Imperial  Government  to  maintain  the  security  and 
integrity  of  the  Empire. "  But  even  the  loyal  Dutch 
of  the  Commonwealth  were  for  the  most  part  opposed 
to  an  expedition  into  German  Southwest  Africa. 
They  felt,  for  they  laiew  their  countrymen,  that  it 
was  asking  too  much  of  the  Boers  to  call  upon  them 
to  be  aggressively  British,  and  to  fight,  when  they 
were  not  being  molested,  for  the  interests  of  the 
Empire  of  which  they  were  an  unwilling  part.  Their 
fears  were  immediately  justified. 

General  Beyers,  Commander-General  of  the  Union 
Defense  Force,  resigned  the  day  after  the  close  of  the 
special  session  of  Parliament,  His  letter  of  resigna- 
tion expressed  surprise  at  Great  Britain's  newly 
awakened  anxiety  to  protect  small  nations.  As  a 
Boer,  it  was  impossible  for  him  to  believe  that  the 

454 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


reasons  given  for  British  interference  to  save  Belgium 
were  anything  else  than  hypocritical  cant. 

When  Beyers  was  called  a  traitor  by  the  Engh'sh 
section  of  the  press,  Boer  loyalists,  although  they 
considered  the  tone  of  Beyers's  letter  a  bit  strong, 
declared  that  he  was  a  man  whose  honesty  could  not 
be  doubted,  and  that  he  had  acted  from  the  purest 
motives.  It  is  difficult  to  judge  the  working  of  the 
mind  of  a  man  who  believes  he  is  a  patriot.  For  the 
sake  of  his  country,  almost  any  man  lies  and  dis- 
simulates, exonerating  himself  on  the  ground  of 
patriotism.  Beyers  probably  thought  he  was  doing 
what  was  right.  But  certainly  his  action  would  have 
been  less  open  to  suspicion  of  bad  faith  had  he 
resigned  the  post  which  boimd  him  to  British  alle- 
giance before  the  British  troops  had  been  withdrawn 
for  service  in  Europe,  and  before  he  had  taken  part 
in  the  councils  that  planned  the  campaign  against 
German  Southwest  Africa.  General  Smuts,  in 
accepting  the  resignation  of  Beyers,  pointed  out  that 
the  plan  of  operations  decided  upon  had  been 
recommended  by  Beyers,  and  that  there  was  no  hint 
given  by  Beyers,  when  the  campaign  was  discussed,  of 
liis  opposition  to  a  campaign  against  the  Germans  or 
of  his  intention  to  resign.  General  Smuts  denounced 
General  Beyers  also  for  having  communicated  the 
letter  of  resignation  to  the  press  before  it  was  given 
to  the  Government,  and  for  his  insinuation  that  the 
loan  of  £7,000,000  granted  to  South  Africa  by 
the  Imperial  Parliament  was  a  bribe  to  induce  the 
Commonwealth  to  take  part  in  the  war. 

The  campaign  against  the  Germans,  which  is 

455 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


described  in  another  place,  had  already  begun  when 
Lieutenant-Colonel  Maritz,  who  commanded  the 
force  in  the  northwest  of  Cape  Colony,  rebelled. 
On  October  8th,  Maritz  refused  to  acknowledge  an 
order  relieving  him  of  liis  command,  and  imprisoned 
the  men  who  brought  the  order.  Their  commander, 
Major  Bouwer,  who  was  sent  back  with  an  ultimatum 
from  Maritz,  reported  that  the  traitor  had  German 
guns  and  a  German  force  at  his  command,  and  was 
sending  as  prisoners  into  German  Southwest  Africa 
all  the  Union  officers  and  men  who  refused  to  de- 
nounce their  allegiance  to  Great  Britain.  Martial 
law  was  immediately  proclaimed  throughout  the 
Commonwealth. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  the  great  majority  of  the 
Boers  of  the  Orange  Free  State,  and  possibly  a  good 
half  of  those  in  the  Transvaal  and  the  Afrikander 
districts  of  Cape  Colony,  were  potential  rebels. 
British  authority  in  the  Commonwealth  depended 
upon  the  loyalty  of  the  more  imjDortant  of  the  Afri- 
kander leaders,  and  particularly  upon  General  Botha 
and  General  Smuts.  It  is  not  too  much  to  say  that 
if  these  two  men  had  adopted  the  same  attitude  as 
General  Hertzog,  South  Africa  would  have  thrown 
off  British  allegiance,  or  at  least  would  have  made 
impossible  the  expedition  against  German  South- 
west Africa. 

Maritz's  action,  on  the  other  hand,  would  have 
had  no  serious  results  were  it  not  for  the  defection 
of  General  Beyers  and  General  Christian  De  Wet. 
For  his  commando  was  routed  and  fled  into  German 
territory  in  less  than  three  weeks.    But  at  that 

456 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


moment  rebellion  broke  out  in  the  Orange  Free 
State  and  in  Western  Transvaal,  De  Wet  command- 
ing in  the  former  and  Beyers  in  the  latter. 

On  October  21st,  General  Christian  De  Wet  made 
a  speech  at  Verde,  a  town  in  the  north  of  the  Free 
State,  in  which  he  declared  that  though  he  had 
"signed  the  Vereeniging  Treaty  and  sworn  to  be 
faithful  to  the  British  flag,  the  Boers  had  been  so 
downtrodden  by  the  miserable  and  pestilential 
English  that  they  could  endure  it  no  longer.  His 
Majesty  King  Edward  VII.  had  promised  to  protect 
them  and  had  failed  to  do  so. "  When  De  Wet  and 
Beyers  took  the  field,  they  were  joined  by  three 
members  of  the  Union  ParHament,  and  by  Mr.  Wesscl 
Wessels,  a  member  of  the  Defense  Council  of  the 
Union.  Preachers  of  great  influence  in  the  Dutch 
Church  went  through  the  country  calling  upon  the 
people  to  take  arms  against  the  British.  Among  the 
Dutch  clergy  a  statement  was  circulated  in  which 
Maritz  was  warmly  defended.  In  this  statement  one 
finds  a  sentence  which  furnishes  food  for  thought 
to  those  in  England  to-day  who  are  cursing  the 
memory  of  Sir  Roger  Casement  and  failing  to  lay 
any  blame  whatever  upon  Sir  Edward  Carson  for 
what  has  happened  recently  in  Ireland 

"Next  year  (19 15)  it  will  be  twenty  years  since 
Jameson  made  his  raid  on  the  Transvaal  to  steal  our 
country,  to  kill  our  Government,  to  destroy  our 
existence  as  a  people,  and  in  addition  our  nationality 
forever,  and  in  all  that  time  we  have  never  had  the 
good  fortune  to  meet  a  single  Englishman  or  English- 
woman who  condemned  the  raid,  not  to  speak  of 

457 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


detestation  and  of  making  Jameson  out  to  be  what 
Maritz  is  now  being  made  out  to  be.  " 

The  manifesto  of  the  rebelHon  was  signed  by 
Beyers,  De  Wet,  Maritz,  Wessels,  Pienaar,  and 
Fourie.  It  has  not  been  published  in  the  press,  and 
is  worth  quoting,  to  indicate  what  the  rebels  had  in 
mind 

"When  we  subscribed  to  the  Treaty  of 'Vereeniging 
and  laid  down  our  arms,  we  were  a  crushed  and  beaten 
people,  driven  to  the  verge  of  starvation  and  despair 
by  the  dishonorable  tactics  of  a  vigorous  and  power- 
ful enemy — our  resources  exhausted  and  our  homes 
destroyed — but  we  accepted  the  inevitable,  and  were 
content  to  forego  our  nationhood  and  our  liberties 
for  the  sake  of  the  future  of  our  people.  We  were 
prepared  to  keep  our  allegiance  to  Great  Britain,  as 
long  as  we  could  do  so  with  honor  to  ourselves  and 
without  ingratitude  to  our  friends.  Now,  however, 
we  are  called  upon  to  choose  between  this  doubtful 
claim  upon  our  loyalty  to  a  relentless  conqueror,  and 
our  gratitude  to  a  friendly  nation,  which  extended  its 
sympathy  and  help  in  the  time  of  danger.  We  are 
being  betrayed  into  this  act  of  base  ingratitude 
either  by  the  folly  or  treachery  of  our  own  Govern- 
ment. Was  it  not  enough  to  ask  us  to  forget  the 
terrible  scenes  we  witnessed  a  few  years  ago,  either 
as  men  on  the  field  of  battle,  fighting  for  our  hard- 
won  freedom,  or  as  youths  flying  with  our  despairing 
women-folk  from  our  burning  homesteads,  or  in  the 
concentration  camps  seeing  them  dying  in  thousands 
around  us,  but  must  we  now  be  compelled  to  take  up 
arms  against  a  nation  that  gave  us  a  helping  hand  in 
our  troubles,  and  plunge  our  people  into  the  horrors 
of  an  extremely  doubtful  European  War?  For  our 
part  we  are  prepared  to  shed  the  last  drop  of  blood 

458 


THE  REBELLION  LN  SOUTH  AFRICA 

rather  than  be  guilty  of  such  cowardly  baseness,  and 
we  call  on  all  those  who  love  honor  and  friendship 
and  gratitude  to  assist  us  in  resisting  it.  We  have  no 
wish  to  shed  the  blood  of  the  people  of  South  Africa, 
English  or  Dutch — far  from  it — but  we  must  em- 
phatically declare  that  the  members  of  the  present 
Government  have  betrayed  their  trust,  and  no  longer 
represent  the  real  feelings  of  the  people  of  South 
Africa.  We  most  emphatically  declare  it  to  have 
been  a  gross  libel  on  the  honor  of  his  countrymen  for 
General  Botha  to  lead  the  Imperial  Government  to 
beheve  that  the  Afrikander  people  were  willing  to 
enter  into  active  and  unprovoked  hostilities  against 
the  German  nation,  with  which  they  had  no  possible 
quarrel,  and  to  which,  indeed,  they  are  closely  united 
by  ties  of  blood,  friendship,  and  of  gratitude.  It  was 
clearly  his  duty  to  inform  the  Imperial  Government 
that,  while  it  could  rely  upon  their  passive  loyalty 
and  obedience,  it  was  too  much  to  expect  that  they 
would  willingly  and  openly  invade  German  territory. 
The  consequence,  therefore,  of  the  present  civil  strife 
must  rest,  morally,  at  any  rate,  on  his  shoulders  and 
those  of  his  Government.  For  ourselves,  we  shall 
not  lay  down  our  arms  until  the  Government  is 
removed  from  office,  and  all  idea  of  invading  German 
territory  is  frankly  abandoned.  We  are  fully  aware 
of  the  gravity  of  our  position,  but  no  other  course 
consistent  with  honor  was  open  to  us,  and  we  leave 
our  motives  to  be  finally  judged  by  the  honorable 
instinct  of  all  men.  Expediency  may  demand  that 
we  be  regarded  and  treated  as  rebels,  but  justice  and 
truth  will  always  proclaim  our  conduct  as  inspired 
by  the  truest  patriotism.  We  do  not  desire  to  set 
up  a  Republic  or  any  other  form  of  Government, 
against  the  wishes  of  the  majority  of  our  fellow- 
citizens.  All  we  ask  is  that  the  people  as  a  whole  be 
allowed  to  say  whether  or  not  they  wish  to  declare 
war  against  Germany,  or  any  other  nation.  We  wish 

459 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  govern  ourselves  in  our  own  way  without  fraud 
or  coercion  from  anyone,  and  we  call  upon  the 
people  to  assist  us  in  attaining  that  ideal. " 

The  rebellion  was  crushed  by  the  energy  and 
decision  of  General  Botha  and  General  Smuts,  who 
put  unhesitatingly  all  the  weight  of  their  influence 
with  the  moderate  section  of  the  Afrikanders  and  of 
their  military  skill  and  organizing  abihty  into  the 
task.  General  Smuts  recalled  part  of  the  little  army 
that  had  been  sent  to  occupy  the  coast  towns  of 
German  Southwest  Africa,  and  succeeded  in  raising 
in  three  weeks  thirty  thousand  armed  volunteers, 
most  of  them  Boers.  General  Hertzog  and  ex- 
President  Steyn,  whose  allegiance  was  doubtful, 
realized  immediately  that  the  rebellion  would  not 
succeed,  and  did  everything  in  their  power  to  open 
up  negotiations  between  the  Government  and  the 
rebels.  But  General  Smuts,  master  of  the  situation 
when  he  saw  that  the  rebels  could  not  muster  more 
than  ten  thousand  armed  men  and  had  to  depend 
upon  a  junction  with  the  Germans  for  ammunition, 
cannon,  and  reinforcements,  declared  that  he  could 
not  treat  with  rebels.  They  must  be  run  to  the 
ground  and  forced  to  surrender  unconditionally. 

So  prompt  was  the  action  of  the  loyalist  forces  that 
the  rebels  were  never  able  to  form  a  junction  of  their 
own  commandos,  much  less  to  get  in  touch  with  the 
Germans.  Only  a  few  hundred  men  with  General 
Kemp  were  able  to  reach  German  territory.  Within 
seven  weeks  all  the  Boers  in  arms,  except  those  who 
got  away  with  Kemp,  were  killed,  captured,  or  sur- 

460 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


rendered  voluntarily.  General  Beyers  was  drowned 
in  trying  to  cross  the  Vaal  River  on  December  9th. 
At  the  end  of  December  the  last  rebels  were  dispersed. 
About  seven  thousand  in  all  had  surrendered  or  were 
captured. 

On  the  day  the  rebellion  was  announced,  a  promi- 
nent Transvaal  Boer  said:  "Without  organization, 
arms,  ammunition,  or  supplies;  without  a  known 
grievance  or  cause,  or  definite  aim;  without  a  com- 
mon plan  or  an  acknowledged  leader;  they  move, 
like  the  ants,  the  locusts,  and  the  springbok,  as  if  an 
unknown  law  of  nature  compelled  it.  Who  can 
understand  the  Boers?  They  are  my  people,  but 
they  beat  me!"'  On  the  whole,  the  observation  of 
this  British  sympathizer  (probably  an  official)  was 
just.  In  one  particular,  however,  he  was  wrong. 
There  was  a  "known  grievance."  There  was  a 
"cause."  There  was  a  "definite  aim" — not  definite 
from  the  military  point  of  view,  but  certainly  definite 
politically.  I  have  taken  the  pains  to  read  through  a 
great  deal  of  polemical  literature  on  this  subject. 
There  is  stUl  much  confusion,  much  contradiction  of 
fact,  and  too  little  perspective  to  get  a  comprehen- 
sive idea  of  what  happened  in  South  Africa  only  two 
'I  years  ago.  But  certain  facts  do  stand  forth  uncon- 
tradicted. And,  in  looking  at  the  rebellion  of  1914 
from  the  point  of  view  of  what  preceded  it  and  what 

'  I  am  indebted  to  an  anonymous  writer  in  the  Round  Table 
I     (London)  for  March  and  September,  1915,  and  June,  1916,  for  valu- 
able  articles  on  the  background  and  consequences  of  the  rebellion. 
They  are  admirably  and  sanely  written,  as  arc  all  the  articles  of  tliis 
indispensable  review. 

461 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


has  followed  it,  there  is  possibility  of  forming  a 
judgment  that  may  not  need  radical  revision. 

It  has  not  been  proved  either  that  the  rebellion 
was  inspired  by  German  agents,  or  that  it  was  an 
organized  attempt  to  regain  independence.  If  it 
had  been  the  former,  the  trials  of  the  ringleaders 
would  certainly  have  brou,ght  out  the  fact.  If  it  had 
been  the  latter,  much  more  enthusiasm  for  the  cause 
could  have  been  aroused  in  South  Africa  by  a  plain 
statement  when  the  first  commandos  took  the  field. 
It  was  not  well  enough  and  wisely  enough  organized 
a  movement  to  be  considered  separatist  in  character. 
More  than  this,  it  is  exceedingly  doubtful  that  men 
like  De  Wet  and  Kemp  and  Beyers — or  any  other 
important  Boer,  in  fact — were  interested,  or  would 
risk  anything,  for  a  movement  to  regain  independ- 
ence. Influential  Boers  did  not  want  a  restoration 
of  the  old  order.  They  knew  that  any  movement  for 
independence  would  be  prejudicial  to  their  own  in- 
terests as  well  as  to  those  of  the  Boer  nation.  Had 
the  movement  been  organized  by  German  agents  or 
by  plotters  against  the  British  Crown,  it  certainly 
would  have  been  postponed  until  a  more  favorable 
moment. 

The  prevalent  view  in  South  Africa  is  that  the 
leaders  drew  blindly  ignorant  followers  after  them 
in  the  hope  that  their  movement  would  lead  to  the 
downfall  of  the  Botha-Smuts  regime,  and  the  coming 
to  power  of  a  real  Afrikander  Cabinet.  They  counted 
on  Botha  and  Smuts  not  getting  enough  Boer  support 
to  oppose  them.  After  they  had  actually  taken  arms, 
they  would  have  been  willing  to  stop  the  movement 

462 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


without  a  single  shot  being  fired  if  Botha  and  Smuts 
had  signified  their  intention  to  resign,  and  go  before 
the  country  in  a  general  election. 

To  a  certain  extent,  this  interpretation  is  true. 
But  English  writers  have  not  been  willing  to  come 
out  squarely  with  a  statement  of  the  issue  the  Hert- 
zog-Steyn  party  wanted  referred  to  the  country. 
The  rebels  were  the  extremists  and  hotheads  of  the 
opposition  to  Botha  and  Smuts.  The  issue  was  this : 
no  aggressive  campaign  should  be  undertaken  against 
German  Southwest  Africa,  especially  by  an  army 
drafted  into  service,  without  consulting  the  country. 
The  proposal  of  the  Imperial  Government  that  South 
Africa  undertake  the  conquest  of  the  neighboring 
German  colony  with  Commonwealth  forces,  accepted 
by  General  Botha,  was  the  one  and  sole  cause  of  the 
rebellion.  General  Botha  knew  that  the  Boers  did 
not  want  to  fight.  He  decided  to  draft  an  army.  A 
portion  of  the  Boers  resisted.  They  called  it  "an 
armed  protest"  and  not  "a  rebellion." 

As  we  have  seen  elsewhere,  ever  since  the  forma- 
tion of  the  Commonwealth,  the  unadulterated  Afri- 
kanders, while  accepting  the  British  "yoke,"  stood 
squarely  against  the  Imperialists  in  maintaining  that 
their  ideal  was  a  South  African  Commonwealth, 
united  with  the  British  Empire  only  as  a  matter  of 
convenience.  They  were  willing  to  live  in  harmony 
with  their  fellow-citizens  of  British  origin  in  the 
development  of  a  Commonwealth,  and  to  give  al- 
legiance to  the  British  Crown,  so  long  as  the  British 
did  not  attempt  to  use  South  Africa  for  serving 
general  British  interests.    The  Imperialists,  on  the 

463 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


other  hand,  maintained  that  South  Africa  was  now 
an  integral  part  of  the  British  Empire,  and  that  all 
should  be  loyal  to  the  "mother  country."  But 
England  was  not  the  mother  country  of  the  Boers ! 

The  outbreak  of  the  European  War  brought  the 
test.  Was  South  Africa  also  at  war  with  Germany? 
Did  allegiance  mean  the  necessity  of  the  Boers  taking 
up  arms  to  attack  a  nation  against  whom  they  had 
no  grievance  and  with  whom  they  were  united  by 
traditional  ties  of  blood  and  sympathy?  Only  if  the 
Germans  invaded  South  Africa,  and  not  before  that 
time,  ought  they  to  be  called  upon  to  fight.  What 
interest  had  they  in  the  quarrel  between  England 
and  Germany?  What  advantage  would  come  to 
them  from  shedding  their  blood  to  conquer  the  Ger- 
man colony  ?  The  fate  of  German  Southwest  Africa 
did  not  interest  them,  and  anyway  it  would  be  de- 
cided upon  the  battlefields  of  Europe,  and  not  by 
anything  they  might  do  or  by  any  sacrifice  they 
might  make.  This  was  the  opinion  .of  a  great  major- 
ity of  the  Boers.  Had  it  not  been  the  opinion  of  a 
great  majority,  the  Government  would  not  have  been 
afraid  to  put  the  issue  before  the  country  in  a 
general  election. 

Immediately  after  the  rebelHon  was  put  down,  the 
question  arose  as  to  the  punishment  to  be  meted  out 
to  the  rebels.  On  November  ii,  1914,  General 
Botha  stated  that  all  who  surrendered  voluntarily 
before  November  21st  would  not  be  criminally  pro- 
secuted at  the  instance  of  the  Government,  except 
those  who  had  taken  a  leading  part  in  the  rebellion 
or  who  had  committed  acts  in  violation  of  the  rules 

464 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


of  civilized  warfare.  On  December  loth,  the  Prime 
Minister  declared: 

"Let  us  remember  that  this  has  been  a  quarrel 
in  our  own  South  African  household,  that  all  of 
us  will  have  to  continue  to  live  together  in  that 
household  in  the  future,  and  while  we  do  our 
duty  in  seeing  that  never  again  shall  there  be  a 
recurrence  of  this  criminal  folly,  let  us  be  on  our 
guard  against  all  vengeful  policies  and  language,  and 
cultivate  a  spirit  of  tolerance,  forbearance,  and 
merciful  oblivion  of  the  errors  and  misdeeds  of  those 
misguided  people,  many  of  whom  took  up  arms 
without  any  criminal  intention.  While  just  and  fair 
punishment  should  be  meted  out,  let  us  also  re- 
member that  now,  more  than  ever,  it  is  for  the  people 
of  South  Africa  to  practice  the  wise  pohcy  of  forgive 
and  forget." 

On  December  20th,  he  reiterated  his  plea  to  the 
British  element  to  try  to  understand  how  the  Boers 
must  feel. 

"For  the  loyalist  Boers,"  he  said,  "it  has  been 
an  unhappy,  indeed  a  tragic  ordeal,  to  have  to 
hunt  down  and  fire  upon  men  —  some  of  them 
their  relatives,  many  of  them  their  friends — who 
were  once  their  comrades  in  arms.  The  Dutch 
loyalists  regard  the  whole  rebellion  as  a  lamentable 
business,  upon  which  the  curtain  should  be  rung 
down  with  as  httle  declamation,  as  little  controversy, 
as  little  recrimination  as  possible.  The  loyal  com- 
mandos have  had  a  hard  task  to  perform.  They 
have  performed  it.  The  cause  of  law  and  order  has 
been,  and  will  be,  vindicated.  Let  that  be  enough. 
This  is  no  time  for  exultation.  Let  us  spare  one 
30  465 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


another's  feelings!  Remember,  we  have  to  live 
together  in  this  land  long  after  the  war  is  ended!" 

It  would  have  been  well  if  General  Botha's  wise 
words  had  been  heeded.  But  racial  animosity  was 
strong — stronger  than  it  had  ever  been  since  the 
days  of  the  Boer  War.  South  Africans  of  British 
extraction,  unable  to  put  themselves  in  the  other 
man's  place,  clamored  for  drastic  punishment.  They 
declared  that  the  loyalist  Boers  had  done  only  their 
duty,  and  that  the  rebels  must  be  tried  and  executed. 
They  insinuated  that  the  loyalist  Boers  had,  during 
the  course  of  the  campaign,  carried  their  feeling  for 
the  rebels  so  far,  that  they  tried  to  do  as  little  killing 
as  possible,  with  the  result  that  the  lives  of  many 
British  loyalists,  fighting  for  the  flag,  were  needlessly 
sacrificed. 

The  rebels  who  had  been  Government  officials  or 
who  held  positions  in  the  National  Defense  forces 
were  tried  by  court  martial  and  dealt  with  according 
to  the  law.  One  of  the  signers  of  the  proclamation, 
Fourie,  was  executed  on  December  21st.  The 
punishment  of  the  others  was  left  to  Parliament, 
which  met  on  February  26,  1915.  For  the  leaders 
it  was  decided  that,  after  being  tried  for  high  treason 
before  a  competent  court,  and  found  guilty,  imprison- 
ment with  or  without  hard  labor  for  life,  or  for  a  term 
of  years,  or  a  fine  not  exceeding  £5000  might  be 
imposed.  The  rank  and  file  of  those  who  had  not 
taken  advantage  of  the  amnesty  ofTer  of  November 
2 1st  were  dealt  with  by  a  general  clause  imposing 
certain  civil  disqualifications  for  a  period  of  ten  years. 

466 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


But  they  were  not  disenfranchised.  General  Botha 
was  extemely  anxious  not  to  lay  himself  open  to  the 
charge  made  so  tellingly  against  Dr.  Jameson  in  Cape 
Colony  after  the  Boer  War,  that  he  used  the  punish- 
ment of  disenfranchisement  to  reduce  the  electoral 
power  of  his  opponents. 

The  curtain  would  have  been  rung  down  very 
quietly  on  the  rebellion,  and  its  aftermath,  from  an 
internal  point  of  view,  might  not  have  increased  the 
racial  antagonism  already  existing,  had  it  not  been 
for  the  outcry  raised  in  Parliament  and  in  the  loyalist 
press  throughout  the  Union  against  these  very  wise 
measures.  General  Botha  found  himself  denounced 
by  the  English  loyalists  for  having  been  afraid  to 
fulfil  his  duty  in  punishing  the  rebels;  while  his  Boer 
opponents  continued  to  declare  that  he  had  sold 
himself  to  the  English  by  acknowledging  that  there 
had  been  a  rebellion  at  all ! 

From  the  standpoint  of  immediate  Imperial  policy, 
the  cooperation  of  South  Africa  in  the  conquest  of 
German  Southwest  Africa  and  German  East  Africa 
was  a  great  success.  Had  the  rebellion  not  occurred, 
the  expedition  to  Southwest  Africa,  composed  as  it 
originally  was  almost  wholly  of  soldiers  of  British 
extraction  (for  General  Botha  at  the  very  beginning 
of  the  rebellion  found  himself  compelled  to  withdraw 
the  obligation  to  serve,  knowing  that  it  could  not  be 
enforced),  would  have  been  a  long-drawn-out  affair, 
if  not  a  failure.  As  it  was,  the  loyalist  Boer  com- 
mandos, who  put  down  the  rebellion,  furnished  a 
splendid  army  for  Southwest  Africa,  and  have  been 
since  a  factor  in  the  conquest  of  East  Africa.  Accord- 

467 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


ing  to  the  Round  Table,  nearly  seventy  thousand 
men  were  under  arms  against  the  rebels  and  in  the 
Southwest  African  campaign.  Twenty-four  thou- 
sand are  in  British  East  Africa  in  the  autumn  of  1916. 
Seven  thousand  five  hundred  joined  Kitchener's 
army  at  their  own  expense,  and  eleven  thousand  are 
serving  in  France  and  Egypt  and  Macedonia  with 
the  overseas  contingents.  The  proportion  of  Boers 
in  the  British  army  to-day  is  naturally  not  nearly  as 
great  as  that  of  volunteers  of  British  extraction. 
But  it  means  a  lot  to  the  British  Empire  that  young 
Boers  are  serving  voluntarily  in  her  army. 

From  the  ulterior  standpoint,  one  may  have  at  this 
time  misgivings  about  the  wisdom  of  using  South 
African  troops  for  the  conquest  of  the  German 
colonies.  Conquered  as  they  have  been  by  South 
African  blood.  Great  Britain  is  not  free  to  use  them 
as  pawns  for  bargaining  in  the  Peace  Conference. 
This  may  cause  considerable  embarrassment  at  the 
end  of  the  war.  Sufficient  to  the  day,  however,  is  the 
evil  thereof. 

In  South  Africa,  since  the  rebellion,  there  have 
been  disquieting  events  to  prove  that  anti-British 
feeling  is  still  strong.  In  the  general  election  of 
October  20,  191 5,  General  Botha's  strong  majority 
dwindled  to  half.  The  radical  Boers,  who  call 
themselves  the  Nationalist  Party,  won  twenty-seven 
seats.  General  Botha  has  a  majority  now  only  with 
Unionist  (British  loyalist)  support.  When  the 
Enemy  Trading  Bill  came  before  Parliament,  Gen- 
eral Hertzog  stated  bluntly  that  his  part  German 
ancestry  did  not  permit  him  to  view  Germany  as  an 

468 


THE  REBELLION  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


Englishman  would.  The  Nationalists,  and  some  of 
General  Botha's  followers  as  well,  fought  this  bill 
tooth  and  nail.  They  fought  equally  a  bill  to  raise 
the  pay  of  volunteers  fighting  overseas  to  the  amount 
given  by  Canada  and  Australia,  although  this  had 
been  insisted  upon  by  the  entire  English-speaking 
section  of  the  electorate  at  the  polls,  and  was  sup- 
ported by  the  labor  members.  General  Botha's  own 
party  was  so  much  in  sympathy  with  the  Nationalists 
on  the  question  of  refusing  to  burden  the  South 
African  taxpayer  more  than  was  absolutely  essential 
to  pay  the  men  who  were  fighting  Britain's  battle, 
that  General  Botha  could  not  press  the  matter.  He 
declared  to  the  Unionists,  when  they  tried  to  get  his 
support  for  the  measure,  "You  have  no  right  to 
press  us.  I  assure  you,  we  are  standing  on  the  brink 
of  a  volcano,  and  you  know  it. " 

When  Lord  Kitchener's  tragic  end  was  reported, 
there  was  much  satisfaction  in  the  Transvaal.  In 
the  Orange  Free  State,  some  towns  held  public 
celebrations. 

Racial  strife  and  antipathy  will  not  cease  in  South 
Africa  as  long  as  one  element  in  the  population  de- 
sires to  have  the  relation  of  the  Commonwealth  to 
Great  Britain  that  of  a  colony  to  the  mother  country. 
This  will  never  be.  But  it  is  possible  for  Boer  and 
Briton  to  live  in  harmony  side  by  side  and  to  fuse 
eventually  into  one  race — a  race  markedly  Anglo- 
Saxon — if  Great  Britain  is  content  to  have  her  flag 
wave  there  as  a  symbol  rather  than  as  a  reality. 


469 


CHAPTER  XXIV 


THE  CONQUEST  OF  THE  GERMAN  COLONIES 

THE  successive  declarations  of  war  during  the 
first  few  days  of  August,  19 14,  left  the  four 
German  colonies  in  Africa,  and  the  Germans 
in  other  parts  of  Africa,  in  a  hopeless  situation.  The 
mastery  of  the  sea  was  assured  to  the  enemies  of 
Germany  when  Great  Britain  decided  to  join  them. 
There  was  no  help,  then,  from  the  outside.  Togo- 
land  and  Kamerun  were  completely  surrounded  by 
colonies  of  the  Allies.  In  Southwest  Africa  Germany 
had  Portugal  on  the  north,  and  in  East  Africa  on  the 
south.  On  the  other  frontiers  were  the  enemy. 
From  the  very  beginning,  Portugal,  the  ally  and  de- 
pendent of  Great  Britain,  was  a  constant  threat  to 
these  two  colonies.  There  were  many  thousands  of 
German  subjects  living  outside  of  German  territory 
in  other  African  colonies.  They  had  refuge  only  for 
a  year  in  Italian  colonies.  There  was  nowhere  else 
in  Africa  where  they  were  unmolested,  except  in 
Abyssinia  and  Liberia,  and  the  wee  colonies  of  Spain. 
But  even  in  Spanish  Morocco  and  internationalized 
Tangier  the  Germans  were  not  safe. 

In  the  new  French  Protectorate  of  Morocco,  at  the 
very  beginning  of  the  war,  conspiracies  of  German 

470 


"1 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  GERMAN  COLONIES 


consuls  and  merchants  were  discovered.  Those  who 
could  get  away  fled  into  the  Riff  and  to  Spain.  The 
rest  were  interned.  Some,  against  whom  complicity 
in  plots  could  be  proved,  were  tried  before  French 
courts-martial  and  shot.  In  Tripoli,  German  con- 
sular officials  and  others  whom  the  Italian  authorities 
claimed  were  military  officers  in  disguise  were  found 
to  be  in  relations  with  Arab  "rebels."  Some  were 
imprisoned,  and  others  expelled.  There  was  no 
immunity  for  Germans  in  French  and  British  and  Bel- 
gian colonies.  In  some  parts  they  were  treated  with 
leniency  at  first.  But  the  news  of  German  successes 
and  German  excesses  in  Europe,  coupled  with  the 
desire  to  put  out  of  the  way  commercial  rivals,  led 
to  imprisonment  in  concentration  camps  and  forcible 
liquidation  and  sequestration  of  business  interests 
everywhere. 

There  were  very  many  old  established  German 
residents  in  the  South  African  Commonwealth,  and 
some  in  Rhodesia.  Among  them  were  men  who  had 
contributed  in  a  most  important  way  to  the  develop- 
ment of  South  Africa.  In  fact,  the  older  German 
firms  had  been  the  invaluable  coadjutors  of  Cecil 
Rhodes  in  the  last  two  decades  of  the  nineteenth 
century.  The  Boers  were  very  friendly  to  the  Ger- 
mans, and  even  after  the  rebellion  and  the  South- 
west Africa  campaign  public  sentiment  would  not 
allow  bona  fide  German  residents  of  the  Common- 
wealth to  be  molested.  The  sinking  of  the  Lusilania, 
however,  led  to  disgraceful  riots  in  Johannesburg  and 
elsewhere.  Germans  were  maltreated,  and  their 
homes  and  business  places  looted  and  destroyed. 

4/1 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  British  element  in  the  Commonwealth  agitated 
in  Parliament,  after  the  passage  of  an  Enemy  Trading 
Bill,  for  the  internment  of  all  Germans  and  the  se- 
questration of  their  properties.  Only  the  return  of 
a  Parliament  in  the  general  election  of  191 6  in  which 
General  Botha's  moderate  Boers  were  caught  without 
a  majority  between  British  and  Boer  fanatics  has 
saved  the  Germans  from  experiencing  a  fate  similar 
to  that  of  those  in  British  Crown  Colonies. 

The  Germans  of  Egypt  were  not  more  immune, 
owing  to  the  peculiar  status  of  the  country,  than  were 
the  Germans  of  Morocco.  They  were  interned  in  con- 
centration camps.  Their  extensive  business  interests 
were  put  into  the  hands  of  receivers  appointed  by  the 
British  authorities,  and  forcibly  liquidated. 

From  the  very  first  day  of  the  war,  Germany  had 
no  hopes  for  Togoland,  whose  geographical  position 
put  the  colony  at  the  mercy  of  France  and  Britain. 
There  were  less  than  two  hundred  Germans  in  the 
colony,  who  had  military  training,  and  they  could 
muster  only  a  thousand  natives.  The  British  sent  a 
force  from  the  Gold  Coast  to  occupy  Lome  on  August 
6,  1914.  At  the  same  moment,  a  French  army 
invaded  Togoland  from  Dahomey.  The  Germans 
offered  to  capitulate,  if  given  honors  of  war.  Un- 
conditional surrender  was  demanded.  The  Germans 
retired  into  the  interior  to  Kamina,  where  the  most 
powerful  wireless  station  in  Africa,  which  could  com- 
municate with  Berlin,  had  just  been  completed.  On 
August  22d,  the  Germans  attacked  the  combined 
French  and  British  forces  between  Atakpame  and 
the  coast.    Beaten  back,  they  destroyed  the  wireless 

472 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  GERAL\N  COLONIES 


station,  and  surrendered  on  August  28th.  The  con- 
quest of  Togoland  was  completed  in  the  first  month 
of  the  war. 

In  the  other  three  colonies,  the  Germans  expected 
to  be  able,  not  only  to  resist  successfully,  but  to  make 
things  hot  for  their  enemies  throughout  Africa.  In 
Southwest  Africa  they  reHed  upon  a  Boer  rebellion. 
In  Kamerun,  they  expected  to  arouse  the  adjacent 
French  Sudan  and  Northern  Nigeria  against  France 
and  Great  Britain.  In  East  Africa,  they  expected 
aid  from  Arabia,  Egypt,  and  the  Sudan.  But  the 
disloyalty  of  the  Boers  in  South  Africa,  as  we  have 
seen  in  the  last  chapter,  did  not  materialize  into  a 
serious  danger  for  the  Commonwealth.  And  the 
Germans  were  all  wrong  in  their  calculation  of  the 
effect  the  alliance  with  Turkey  and  the  proclamation 
of  the  Holy  War  would  have  upon  Islam  in  North 
and  Central  Africa.  Not  for  a  moment  was  French 
or  British  authority  seriously  menaced  in  any 
African  colony.  One  might  put  the  statement  a 
little  more  strongly.  Far  from  being  embarrassed  by 
holding  Moslem  colonies  and  protectorates  in  Africa, 
France  and  Great  Britain  have  found  in  these  pos- 
sessions a  source  of  strength  and  great  aid  in  prosecut- 
ing the  war.  African  Moslems  have  constituted  a 
very  precious  element  in  the  French  armies  in  Europe. 

Giving  tit  for  tat  and  a  little  more,  Great  Britain 
has  turned  the  tables  on  the  Turks  and  Germans  who 
coimted  her  possession  of  Eg>'pt  a  military  weakness, 
and  has  used  Egypt  to  wean  away  the  Shereef  of 
Mecca  from  his  allegiance  to  Turkey. 

What  fighting  France  and  Italy  have  had  to  do  in 

473 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Morocco  and  Tripoli  was  in  no  sense  a  repercussion 
of  the  European  War,  but  the  continuation  of  mili- 
tary operations  of  the  ante-bellum  period.  In  all 
Africa,  only  the  Sultan  of  Darfur  responded  to  the 
IQialif 's  call  to  the  Holy  War.  He  waited  nearly  two 
years,  and  when  he  was  getting  ready  to  make  trouble 
in  the  Sudan,  he  was  quickly  suppressed  by  a  small 
expeditionary  corps  from  Khartum.'  The  only 
other  fighting  in  Africa,  outside  of  that  involved  in 
the  conquest  of  the  German  colonies,  was  on  the 
western  and  eastern  frontiers  of  Egypt.  On  the 
west,  the  Senussi,  who  had  been  carrying  on  a  very 
successful  campaigns  against  the  Italians  in  the 
Tripolitaine,  attacked  the  British  at  the  end  of  191 5. 
They  occupied  Solium,  and  advanced  at  several 
points  towards  the  Nile  valley  from  the  Libyan 
Desert.  But  they  were  very  soon  driven  out  of 
Egyptian  territory,  and  suffered  heavily.  In  the 
east,  the  Turks  advanced  across  the  Isthmus  of  Suez, 
and  attacked  the  Canal  in  March,  1915.  The  at- 
tempt was  unsuccessful.  In  191 6,  the  British  kept  a 
large  army  on  the  Canal,  which  they  had  fortified 
very  carefully.^    At  the  time  of  this  writing,  the 

'  See  above,  pp.  19  (note)  and  341. 

'  I  had  the  privilege  of  visiting  the  British  army  on  the  Suez  Canal 
in  January  and  February,  1916.  In  the  latter  month,  the  system  of 
defenses  had  been  worked  out  sufficiently  for  the  visitor  to  get  a  good 
idea  of  the  plan  and  a  firm  conviction  that  the  Germano-Turks  would 
never  attack  successfully  the  Canal.  The  General  Staff  detailed  an 
officer  to  show  me  the  first  lines  to  the  east  of  the  Canal,  and  allowed 
me  to  see  the  maps  they  had  made  of  the  Isthmus.  Whatever  fault 
there  had  been  in  1915,  it  is  sure  that  a  year  later  the  British  were 
in  a  position  not  to  be  caught  napping  again. 

474 

) 
> 

) 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  GERMAN  COLONIES 


British  forces  have  cleared  the  Turks  out  of  the 
Isthmus,  and  are  waiting  only  for  the  progress  of  the 
Arab  rebellion  against  Turkey  to  cooperate  with 
the  Shereef  of  Mecca  in  the  occupation  of  Palestine. 

German  Southwest  Africa  was  quite  unprepared 
to  repel  an  invasion.  The  Germans  had  no  army  in 
the  colony.  Since  the  Herero  War,  peace  had  reigned 
and  the  Germans  had  devoted  themselves  to  eco- 
nomic development.  In  spite  of  absurd  stories  that 
have  been  written  to  the  contrary,  the  armed  forces 
of  the  colony  were  only  large  enough  to  do  police 
duty,  and  their  supply  of  arms  and  ammunition  did 
not  enable  them  to  offer  serious  resistance  to  the 
overwhelming  forces  General  Botha  was  able  to 
bring  against  them.  The  situation  had  possibilities 
for  the  Germans,  only  if  the  Boer  rebellion  had  been 
successful,  or  if  all  the  Boers  had  refused  to  bear  arms 
against  them. :  'The  Southwest  African  campaign 
demonstrated  beyond  the  possibility  of  doubt  either 
that  Germany  was  not  expecting  a  war  with  Great 
Britain,  or  that,  in  case  of  war,  there  was  no  intention 
to  stir  up  the  Boers.  This  statement  may  be  con- 
tested. But  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  a  General  Staff 
such  as  the  German  one  has  proved  itself  to  be  would 
not  have  been  organizing  and  preparing  thoroughly 
for  years  in  Southwest  Africa,  if  Southwest  Africa 
had  been  in  the  plan  of  future  military  operations. 

The  operations  of  General  Botha  are  uninteresting: 
for  when  an  army  of  fifty  thousand,  well  equipped 
for  every  possible  need,  goes  after  an  army  of  five 
thousand  in  a  country  where  supplies  are  lacking  and 
munitions  once  used  cannot  be  renewed,  what  is  there 

475 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


to  write  about?  The  Commonwealth  forces  were 
not  very  well  handled,  for  they  allowed  the  Germans 
to  escape  time  after  time.  When  the  capital,  Wind- 
huk,  was  occupied  on  May  I2th,  after  the  Common- 
wealth forces  had  been  four  months  in  the  field,  the 
Germans  retired  to  the  north.  When  they  were 
followed  to  Grootfontein,  and  there  was  nothing  to 
retire  to  except  bush,  and  no  food  to  be  found  along 
the  only  line  of  retreat,  the  Germans,  to  the  number 
of  thirty-five  hundred,  surrendered  on  July  9,  1915. 
The  Germans,  against  overwhelming  odds,  main- 
tained their  force  practically  complete.  One  does 
not  know  whether  to  credit  German  skill  or  to  dis- 
credit the  skill  of  General  Sir  Duncan  Mackenzie, 
who  seemed  totally  unable  to  get  any  good  out  of  all 
the  advantages  he  possessed. 

In  Kamerun  and  East  Africa,  while  the  odds  in  the 
way  of  supplies  were  equally  great  against  the  Ger- 
mans, they  were  not  overwhelmed  by  a  huge  army 
as  in  Southwest  Africa.  So  they  were  able  to  get  the 
best  out  of  skill  and  resourcefulness,  courage  and 
endurance.  The  bitterest  enemy  of  the  Germans 
must  acknowledge  that  their  defense  in  Kamerun 
and  East  Africa  stamps  the  officers  who  conducted 
the  troops  in  these  two  colonies  as  the  very  best  sort 
of  sportsmen.  In  Kamerun  the  Germans  held  out 
for  a  year  and  a  half,  and  then  succeeded  in  avoiding 
capture.  In  East  Africa,  after  more  than  two  years 
of  being  cut  off  from  the  outside  world,  they  are 
still  in  the  field,  with  a  navy  and  four  armies  against 
them. 

As  there  were  not  many  German  troops  in  Kam- 

476 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  GERmN  COLONIES 


erun,  and  the  British  in  Nigeria  believed  they  would 
be  received  by  the  Kamerun  natives  as  liberators, 
they  counted  on  a  six  weeks'  campaign  to  destroy  or 
capture  the  German  forces  in  Kamerun.  On  August 
25,  1914,  a  Nigerian  force  crossed  the  frontier.  In 
the  following  week  two  other  British  columns  in- 
vaded Kamerun.  The  Germans  brought  up  their 
mobile  native  troops  with  lightning  rapidity,  and 
drove  back  into  Nigerian  territory  the  invaders.  On 
the  coast,  owing  to  the  protection  of  warships,  French 
and  British  troops  were  able  to  effect  landings  at  the 
ports.  At  the  mouth  of  the  Kamerun  River,  Duala, 
the  capital,  was  occupied,  and  forty  thousand  tons  of 
German  shipping  captured.  The  war  continued 
throughout  the  whole  year  of  191 5,  all  three  of  the 
belligerents  employing  black  troops.  When  the 
Allies  were  able  to  bring  up  their  heavy  guns  against 
a  fortified  post,  the  Germans  had  no  chance  whatever. 
But  they  held  out  each  time  until  the  Allies  had  ex- 
pended an  enormous  amount  of  invaluable  ammuni- 
tion, and  destroyed  the  buildings  and  supplies  that 
could  not  be  moved.  Never  once  were  their  ene- 
mies able  to  surround  them.  Their  three  thousand 
black  soldiers,  led  by  two  hundred  and  fifty  white 
officers,  completely  baffled  the  efforts  of  Major-Gen- 
eral  Dobell's  eight  thousand  British,  French,  and 
Belgian  soldiers.  When  their  ammunition  gave  out, 
they  had  so  manoeuvered  their  retreat  as  to  be  able 
to  cross  to  safety  into  Rio  Muni,  the  little  Spanish 
enclave  in  Kamerun. 

Admirable  as  the  Kamerun  campaign  was,  from 
the  German  point  of  view,  it  was  rivalled  by  that  in 

477 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


East  Africa.  The  Wangoni  rebellion,  in  1906,  had 
taught  the  Germans  in  East  Africa  what  the  British 
and  French  had  long  known,  the  value  of  recruiting 
and  training  native  soldiers.  The  mistake  of  the 
Herero  rebellion  in  Southwest  Africa  was  not  re- 
peated. White  troops  were  recalled,  and  some 
natives  from  German  New  Guinea  introduced  to  in- 
corporate with  East  African  levies.  During  the  eight 
years  between  1906  and  1914,  the  Germans  in  East 
Africa  paid  great  attention  to  native  troops,  and 
built  up  a  splendid  army.  When  war  was  declared 
in  1 9 14,  they  did  not  wait  to  be  invaded.  They 
crossed  into  the  Belgian  Congo,  attacked  posts  in 
Rhodesia,  and  threatened  the  British  East  African 
frontier.  On  the  lakes,  there  was  naval  warfare. 
Until  the  Home  Governments  of  their  enemies  were 
able  to  give  serious  attention  to  the  problem  of  the 
conquest  of  East  Africa,  the  Germans  were  fairly 
evenly  matched  with  their  neighbors.  For  there 
were  not  many  troops  in  British  East  Africa  and 
Uganda,  and  practically  none  in  Rhodesia  and 
Nyasaland,  save  what  were  absolutely  essential  for 
police  purposes.  There  were  twenty  thousand  black 
troops  in  the  Belgian  Congo.  But  the  Belgian 
authorities  felt  they  had  their  hands  full  in  looking 
after  their  own  territories,  and  were  content  to  re- 
main on  the  defensive. 

At  the  beginning  of  191 5,  three  companies  of 
British  Indian  infantry,  who  were  holding  the  post  of 
Jasin  in  German  territory,  were  surrounded  by  Ger- 
man black  troops,  who  forced  them  to  surrender, 
after  an  attempt  at  relief  had  failed.    It  was,  on  a 

478 


CONQUEST  OF  THE  GERMAN  COLONIES 


very  small  scale  of  course,  a  prelude  to  Kut-el-Amara. 
The  Indians  were  sacrificed  to  the  rashness  of  their 
British  officers,  who  were  betrayed  by  overconfidence 
and  disdain  of  the  enemy  into  an  unjustified  forward 
movement  that  ended  in  humiliation.  At  the  end  of 
191 5,  the  Germans  were  in  possession  of  the  whole  of 
the  East  Africa  colony,  coast  line  and  boundaries  as 
well  as  interior.  It  was  decided  to  call  upon  the 
South  Africans  to  conquer  the  colony,  and  General 
Smith  Dorrien  was  appointed  to  command  the 
invasion.  Early  in  191 6,  the  British  General  re- 
signed his  command  "for  reasons  of  health" — the 
polite  and  invariable  formula — and  was  succeeded 
by  General  Botha.  Germany's  declaration  of  war 
upon  Portugal  brought  another  enemy  into  the 
field. 

The  reports  from  East  Africa  during  the  spring  and 
summer  of  191 6  were  very  vague.  But  each  official 
bulletin  brought  the  news  of  a  new  success  for  the 
combined  South  African,  Rhodesian,  Portuguese, 
Belgian,  Indian,  and  British  armies.  On  September 
4th,  Dar-es-Salaam  was  captured,  and  on  the  i8th, 
the  two  last  footholds  of  the  Germans  on  the  coast 
fell  into  the  hands  of  the  British.  The  whole  line  of 
railway  across  the  colony  was  occupied  before  the 
end  of  September.  It  is  probable  that  when  this 
book  goes  to  press,  the  conquest  of  the  last  German 
colony  in  Africa  will  have  been  completed.  As 
there  is  no  neutral  territory  to  which  they  can  retire, 
the  Germans  will  be  compelled  to  surrender. 

The  story  of  the  Great  War  in  Africa  has  demon- 
strated two  things,  one  of  which  was  not  expected  by 

479 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


the  Germans,  and  the  other  of  which  was  not  expected 
by  their  enemies. 

The  collapse  of  their  hopes  of  Islamic  uprisings,  or 
rather  a  coordinated  Islamic  movement  in  North 
and  Central  Africa,  is  a  severe  blow  to  Germany  and 
her  allies.  By  the  same  token,  it  is  a  remarkable 
testimony  to  the  hold  France  and  Great  Britain 
have  over  the  natives  under  their  flags. 

The  ability  of  German  officers  in  Kamerun  and 
East  Africa  to  command  the  loyalty  of  their  native 
troops  and  the  cooperation  of  the  inhabitants  of 
these  two  colonies  is  a  big  surprise  to  France  and 
Great  Britain,  and  disproves  the  thesis  that  the  na- 
tives of  the  portions  of  Africa  over  which  Germany 
ruled  were  eager  to  welcome  British  and  French 
liberators. 

In  conclusion,  by  the  test  of  this  cataclysm,  which 
has  brought  half  of  Europe  against  the  other  half, 
one  can  affirm  the  stability  of  European  institutions 
in  Africa,  and  the  lack  of  desire  or  power  of  the  in- 
habitants of  any  part  of  Africa  to  change  the  political 
status  under  which  they  have  been  brought  during 
the  last  two  decades. 


480 


CHAPTER  XXV 


AFRICAN  PROBLEMS  FOR  THE  PEACE 
CONFERENCE 

IF  one  maintains  that  the  attitude  of  the  Powers 
towards  the  problems  that  come  before  the 
Peace  Conference  depends  upon  the  miHtary 
position  of  the  two  groups  of  belligerents  at  the  time 
the  armistice  is  signed,  he  can  see  no  use  in  discuss- 
ing peace  problems.  For  there  will  be  no  peace 
problems.  The  victors  will  refuse  to  consider 
problems.  They  will  impose  conditions  on  the  time- 
honored  basis  of  "  Vce  victis!"  It  will  be  a  peace 
in  which  superior  force  is  the  decisive  factor,  not 
only  the  combined  superior  force  of  one  group  of 
belligerents  over  the  other,  but  the  comparative 
superior  force  of  the  states  in  the  victorious  group. 
If  peace  is  made  on  this  basis,  the  war  will  have  been 
fought  in  vain. 

Europe  will  remain  an  armed  camp.  The  victors 
will  need  standing  armies  to  maintain  their  terms. 
The  vanquished  will  hope  to  reverse  the  decision 
of  force  by  building  up  bigger  armies  than  they  ever 
had  before  and  by  diplomatic  intrigue.  France  did 
this  after  1815  and  1870,  Russia  after  1854  and 
31  481 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


1878,  and  Austria-Hungary  after  1859  and  1866. 
Great  Britain  all  the  while  was  guided  by  the  sole 
consideration  of  throwing  in  her  sword  to  prevent 
any  continental  Power  from  becoming  strong  enough 
to  menace  her  world  supremacy. 

But  in  this  war,  from  the  very  beginning,  France 
and  Great  Britain  have  made  the  issue  a  moral  one. 
They  appeal  to  the  whole  world  for  sympathy  and 
for  support  on  the  groimd  that  they  took  up  the  sword 
for  the  sake  of  humanity.  Premier  Viviani,  in  the 
Chamber  of  Deputies,  and  Prime  Minister  Asquith, 
in  the  House  of  Commons,  solemnly  declared  in 
the  name  of  France  and  Great  Britain  that  these 
two  Powers  were  not  fighting  for  territorial  aggran- 
dizement, but  for  the  principles  of  international 
law  and  the  freedom  of  small  nations.  Germany, 
on  the  other  hand,  was  convicted  before  the  court 
of  world  opinion  of  being  the  aggressor  and  actually 
starting  the  war,  and  of  attacking  Belgium  wholly 
without  provocation,  although  she  had  assumed  the 
international  obUgation  to  maintain  Belgian  neutral- 
ity. Russia's  recent  record  was  worse  than  that 
of  Germany,  and  her  cruelties  in  the  initial  cam- 
paigns fully  as  shocking.  Neutral  pubUc  opinion 
throughout  the  whole  world,  however,  sustained 
unhesitatingly  the  cause  of  the  Entente  Allies. 
There  was  deep  sympathy  with  the  wrongs  inflicted 
upon  Httle  Belgium  and  little  Serbia.  There  was 
disgust  of  German  methods  of  beginning  and  con- 
ducting the  war.  But  most  of  all,  neutral  public 
opinion  rallied  to  the  Entente  Allies  because  of 
belief  in  the  sincerity  of  the  appeals  made  for  its 

482 


UNSETTLED  AFRICAN  PROBLEAIS 


sympathy  on  the  ground  of  fighting  the  battle  of 
humanity. 

The  small  neutrals  in  Europe  are  at  the  mercy 
of  the  combatants.  WTiatever  they  may  think, 
the  expression  of  their  thoughts  is  muzzled  by  geo- 
graphical and  economic  conditions.  Even  if  they 
were  free  to  translate  thought  into  action,  the  force 
they  could  muster  would  not  count  for  much  on  sea 
or  on  land.  The  South  American  states  are  de- 
pendent upon  foreign  capital,  foreign  products, 
foreign  markets,  and  foreign  steamship  lines.  They 
must  acquiesce  in  the  general  international  decisions 
of  the  United  States  and  Europe.  The  three  large 
South  American  cotmtries,  Brazil,  Chile,  and  Argen- 
tina, have  combined  only  about  ten  per  cent,  of  the 
population  of  European  origin  that  the  United 
States  possesses.  In  wealth  and  resources  as  well 
as  in  population,  the  important  neutral  is  the 
United  States.  By  institutions  and  by  blood,  it  is 
natural  that  the  ovenvhelming  majority  of  Ameri- 
cans shotdd  sympathize  with  France  and  Great 
Britain. 

But  one  cannot  insist  too  strongly  upon  the  point 
that  the  people  of  the  United  States  do  not  hate — 
do  not  even  dislike — the  people  of  Germany.  What 
they  do  hate  is  the  picture  of  Germany  that  has  been 
held  up  before  them  during  the  war — a  nation,  gone 
mad  by  lust  for  power  and  blood  and  destruction, 
bHndly  upholding  a  ruler  and  statesmen  who  have 
upset  the  peace  of  the  world,  trampled  upon  small 
nations,  and  violated  the  principles  of  humanity  in 
order  to  dominate  the  world.    In  sharp  rcHef  to 

483 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


this  picture  is  that  of  the  Entente  Allies,  nobly- 
struggling  to  save  the  world  from  Prussian  militar- 
ism, sacrificing  themselves  to  defend  humanity, 
and  pledged  to  a  peace  that  will  establish  the  world 
upon  a  new  basis  of  justice  and  freedom  for  all 
mankind. 

As  long  as  the  pictures  remain  as  they  are,  the 
Entente  Allies  are  assured  of  American  sympathy. 
If  they  are  the  victors,  and  go  to  the  Peace  Confer- 
ence to  fulfil  the  pledges  of  their  statesmen,  with 
the  intention  of  establishing  peace  on  a  durable 
basis,  they  will  have  American  cooperation  and 
American  support.  As  this  cooperation  and  sup- 
port will  be  a  precious  asset,  it  is  the  duty  of  Ameri- 
can writers,  who  have  loyally  supported  from  the 
very  beginning  the  cause  of  the  Allies,  to  present 
and  to  discuss  problems  of  the  futiare  Peace  Confer- 
ence in  a  spirit  of  frankness. 

In  international  relations,  the  African  settlement 
is  going  to  be  as  important  and  as  significant  for  the 
future  as  have  been  the  African  developments. 
The  history  of  Africa  in  the  last  generation,  and 
especially  in  the  decade  immediately  preceding  the 
war,  shows  the  vital  part  of  European  rivalry  in 
Africa  in  forming  the  alliances  and  in  stirring  up 
the  friction  that  made  a  European  War  inevitable. 
Unless  the  African  settlement  is  made  upon  a  basis 
of  broad  statesmanship,  the  peace  treaty  will  con- 
tain embers  of  a  fire  unquenched,  ready  to  break 
out  again  when  fresh  fuel  is  thrown  upon  it. 

The  great  question  is  this :  Will  Germany  be  ex- 
cluded from  Africa,  or  will  she  be  readmitted  to 

484 


UNSETTLED  AFRICAN  PROBLEMS 


cooperate  in  the  development  of  the  continent  on  a 
basis  that  will  give  satisfaction  to  the  abilities  and 
necessities  and  aspirations  of  the  German  people? 

The  partisan,  in  the  heat  of  the  conflict,  opens  his 
eyes  in  amazement  and  indignation  at  this  question. 
He  denounces  you  as  a  pro-German.  If  you  con- 
vince him  that  you  are  sincere  in  your  friendship, 
he  asks  how  you  can  be  so  naive  as  to  expect  the 
Allies  to  return  to  Germany  what  they  have  taken 
from  her.  "We  have  Germany  at  our  mercy.  She 
is  beaten.  She  and  all  her  partners  must  pay  the 
price  of  their  crime  against  civilization.  Do  you 
not  beheve  in  punishment.'*" 

This  reasoning  is  precisely  that  of  Germany  in 
1870.  Germany  declared  to  the  world  that  she 
was  not  fighting  the  French,  but  was  mercifully 
ridding  them  of  their  War  Lord,  who  was  trying  to 
lead  France  along  the  path  followed  by  the  first 
Napoleon.  But  the  lust  of  pillage  and  conquest 
caught  the  Germans  with  the  first  victories.  The 
resistance  of  France  maddened  them.  They  told 
the  neutral  world  they  could  not  afford  to  be  kept 
in  continual  jeopardy  by  the  militarist  ambitions  of 
France.  They  must  annex  territory  (which  had 
once  been  German)  to  protect  themselves  against 
French  aggression.  The  memory  was  still  alive  of 
the  invasion  of  Germany  by  the  first  Napoleon,  and 
they  burned  to  wipe  out  the  humiliation  of  Jena  and 
Napoleon's  entry  to  Berlin.  They  had  to  bring 
France  to  her  knees  and  punish  her.  The  punish- 
ment was  a  boomerang.  Instead  of  securing  the 
tranquillity  of  the  next  generation,  the  Treaty  of 

485 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


Frankfort  has  brought  disaster  upon  the  children 
of  those  who  imposed  it  upon  France. 

Aside  from  the  argument  of  punishment,  the  only 
justification  of  France  and  Great  Britain  for  re- 
taining the  German  colonies  wotild  be:  economic  ne- 
cessity of  keeping  the  colonies;  or  the  claim  that 
Germany  had  forfeited  her  right  to  them,  through 
barbarous  treatment  of  the  natives  or  incapacity  to 
administer  and  develop  the  colonies.  A  survey  of 
the  distribution  of  African  territory,  and  the  history 
of  the  last  decade  of  European  colonization  in  Africa, 
are  sufficient  to  make  invalid  both  these  grounds.* 
Even  were  there  reasonable  doubt  here,  is  not  the 
heavy  loss  of  men  and  money  during  the  present 
war  going  to  retard  the  administrative  and  economic 
development  of  the  colonies  France  and  Great 
Britain  already  possess?  Is  it  wise  to  assume  new 
obligations? 

If  the  Entente  Allies  have  in  mind  the  destruction 
of  Prussian  militarism,  this  can  be  best  accompHshed 
by  giving  Germany  a  large  part  in  the  development 
of  Africa.    The  student  of  German  pohtics  during 

'  The  reports  of  British  consuls  in  the  German  colonies,  and  of 
governors  and  other  officials  of  adjacent  British  colonies,  from 
1906  to  1913,  are  high  in  their  praise  of  German  efficiency  and  Ger- 
man courtesy,  and  of  the  fact  that  British  trade  and  traders  received 
fair  treatment.  Commerce  was  far  easier  and  more  profitable  for 
British  in  German  than  in  French  and  Portuguese  colonies.  Several 
ofScers  of  the  British  army,  speaking  since  the  present  war  began, 
have  assured  me  that  in  boundary  commissions  and  other  common 
tasks,  they  got  along  better  with  the  German  officers  than  with 
those  of  any  other  nation  in  Africa.  "They  are  really  more  our 
sort,  you  know,"  was  the  candid  confession. 

486 


UNSETTLED  AFRICAN  PROBLEMS 


the  past  fifteen  years  is  convinced  that  sufficient 
popular  support  for  army  and  na\'y  credits  was 
gained  by  the  German  Weltpolitik  advocates  only 
because  they  were  able  to  convince  the  electorate 
of  the  necessity  of  colonies,  both  for  excess  popula- 
tion and  for  markets,  and  that  the  rivals  of  Germany 
were  doing  all  in  their  power  to  grab  what  was  left 
of  the  world  and  to  prevent  Germany  from  getting 
her  "place  in  the  sun."  The  population  and  re- 
sources of  Germany  increased  marvelously  since  the 
accession  of  the  present  Kaiser.  The  advocacy  of 
a  poHcy  of  establishing  overseas  dominions,  where 
great  markets  for  exports  could  be  developed,  raw 
materials  grown,  emigrants  saved  to  Deutschtiim, 
and  German  Kultur  and  language  spread,  was  re- 
sisted for  many  years  by  the  German  electorate. 
But  in  recent  years  imperialism,  fostered  by  these 
arguments,  has  become  no  less  attractive  to  the 
Germans  than  to  the  French  and  British.  ^  National 
instinct  is  the  same  the  world  over. 

'  Englishmen  think  exactly  as  Germans  do.  In  a  visit  to  New 
Zealand  in  1916,  Sir  Rider  Haggard  declared:  "We  are  anxious  to 
see  that  the  men  who  leave  Great  Britain  .  .  .  remain  somewhere 
within  the  shadow  of  the  British  flag,  and  do  not  settle  in  the  United 
States  or  Argentine  or  some  other  foreign  country  .  .  .  the  Empire 
cannot  afford  to  lose  these  people.  .  .  .  No  expense  is  too  great 
and  no  thought  too  high  to  give  to  the  problem  of  how  to  retain 
within  the  Empire  our  own  citizens."  Commenting  on  this  state- 
ment the  Auckland  Star  said:  "The  material  progress  and  strength 
necessary  for  safety  depend  upon  man-power,  and  the  Empire 
must  see  that  that  power  is  conserved  by  everj-  possible  means. 
Emigration  to  places  beyond  the  Empire  must  be  vigorously  dis- 
couraged. .  .  .  The  point  to  be  emphasized  now  is  that  men  and 
women  desirous  of  a  change  must  be  kept  within  the  Empire." 
The  Round  Table  for  September,  19 16,  remarks  that  Sir  Rider 

487 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


The  Germans  bubbled  over.  Perhaps  they  ought 
not  to  have  done  so.  But  could  they  have  helped 
it  ?  Where  did  they  have  a  good  chance  to  expend 
the  newly-created  excess  of  national  energy  and 
national  pride  and  national  creative  longing?  When 
a  bottle  is  overflowing,  and  you  try  to  keep  in  the 
cork,  the  bottle  breaks,  and  the  hand  that  pressed 
down  the  cork  gets  hit  by  flying  pieces  of  glass.  A 
repetition  of  the  act  is  folly.  Here  is  the  kernel  of 
the  European  problem. 

After  an  unsuccessful  war,  if  their  eyes  are  opened 
to  the  unwelcome  truth  that  they  have  been  deluded 
by  their  leaders  into  fighting  a  policy  of  encircle- 
ment that  had  no  truth  in  it,  the  German  people 
will  themselves  make  short  work  of  the  Kaiserism, 
Junkerism,  and  Prussian  militarism  we  abhor.  But 
if  their  colonies  are  taken  from  them,  and  they  are 
shut  off  from  trading  with  Africa  and  Asia  and  Aus- 
tralasia, they  will  find  in  the  peace  terms  of  their 
enemies  ample  justification  for  having  fought  the  war, 
and  will  give  their  Kaiser  and  his  statesmen  and 
generals  credit  for  having  done  their  best  to  avert  the 
conspiracy  whose  existence  will  have  been  proved 
in  their  eyes  by  the  fact  of  its  success.  Instead  of 
being  chastened  and  repentant,  they  will  be  defiant. 
Instead  of  mourning  the  useless  sacrifice  of  fathers 
and  sons,  of  husbands  and  brothers,  the  dead  will  be 
martyrs  of  a  sacred  cause,  whose  memory  will  keep 
alive  the  determination  to  devote  energies  and  brains, 

Haggard's  appeal  is  curiously  like  those  made  by  Froude  in  1870 
in  his  articles  on  England  and  her  colonies  in  volume  ii.  of  Short 
Studies  on  Great  Subjects. 

488 


UNSETTLED  x\FRICAN  PROBLEMS 


and  to  consecrate  the  new  generation,  to  the  build- 
ing up  of  a  new  war  machine.  The  enemies  of 
Germany  could  not  prevent  this.  You  can  knock 
a  man  down.  But  if  you  want  to  keep  him  down, 
you  must  sit  on  him,  and  keep  sitting  on  him.  He 
who  imposes  his  will  upon  another  by  force  generally 
becomes  the  victim  of  his  victory. 

There  is  another  extremely  important  considera- 
tion that  should  convince  statesmen  of  the  wisdom 
of  welcoming  Germany  to  a  more  important  part 
than  she  has  yet  had  in  the  development  of  European 
civilization  in  Africa.  There  are  ninety  milhon 
Germans  in  Central  Europe.  If  they  are  barred 
from  overseas  development,  they  will  own  Poland  in 
spite  of  the  efforts  of  the  Poles  and  Russians,  and 
they  will  be  masters  of  the  Balkan  Peninsula  and 
Asia  Minor.  Many  Germans  have  been  opposed 
to  the  colonies,  and  are  glad  now  that  their  country 
has  been  put  out  of  Africa,  for  the  very  reason  that 
all  the  energies  and  resources  of  Germany  might  be 
redirected  to  the  Drang  nach  Ostcn.  The  only  way 
to  prevent  Germany  from  remaining,  even  after  a 
crushing  defeat,  the  greatest  military  and  political 
factor  in  Europe  is  to  give  her  an  outlet — an  ample 
outlet — in  Africa.  The  j)olicy  of  tr^-ing  at  every 
turn  to  forestall  the  hesitating  development  of 
German  colonial  enterprise  was  highly  successful 
in  Africa  and  elsewhere.  It  gave  to  Great  Britain 
and  France  larger  colonial  empires  and  commercial 
and  political  advantages,  of  which  the  Occidental 
Powers  have  made  excellent  use.  It  obstructed 
German  "intrigues"  in  Asiatic  Turkey  and  Persia. 

489 


THE  NEW  MAP  OF  AFRICA 


It  prevented  Germany  from  establishing  coaling- 
stations  and  naval  ports.  But  it  is  exacting  now 
a  fearful  toll  of  French  and  British  lives.  Were  the 
gains  worth  the  price  that  is  being  paid?  One 
doubts  seriously  whether  they  were  gains — or  even 
diplomatic  advantages.  A  river,  deflected  from  one 
channel,  finds  another.  If  it  does  not,  it  bursts  over 
the  dam,  and  gets  back  into  the  old  channel.  //  does 
not  stop  running.  The  natural  economic  laws  at 
work  in  the  world  cannot  be  set  aside  by  diplomatic 
combinations.  You  cannot  get  rid  of  a  fact  by  re- 
fusing to  see  it.  From  the  physical  as  well  as  the 
intellectual  standpoint  the  Germans  are  the  most 
powerful  ethnic  group  in  Europe.  They  are  un- 
rivaled in  their  energy,  their  discipline,  and  their 
commercial  and  scientific  ability.  In  number,  they 
equal,  if  they  do  not  surpass,  the  Russians.  Their 
geographical  position  is  the  strongest  of  the  European 
races.    Damn  them  if  you  will;  but  there  they  are. 

The  United  States  is  vitally  interested  in  a  wise 
and  politic  settlement  of  the  European  War.  We 
have  potent  reasons,  aside  from  resentment  over 
the  Belgian  invasion,  the  nefarious  activity  of  sub- 
marines, and  the  intrigues  on  American  soil,  to  wish 
for  the  destruction  of  Prussian  militarism  and  the 
return  of  the  German  people  to  the  rest  of  the  world's 
way  of  looking  at  things.  We  have  no  faith  in 
Russia.  Her  attitude  toward  Poland  and  toward 
the  Jews  is  as  abominable  as  it  was  before  the  war. 
The  only  explanation  of  the  failure  of  liberal  public 
opinion  in  France  and  Great  Britain  to  come  out 
generously  and  impressively  in  favor  of  Poles  and 

490 


UNSETTLED  AFRICAN  PROBLEMS 


Jews  is  that  political  blackmail — unofficial,  perhaps, 
but  none  the  less  powerful — has  kept  London  and 
Paris  newspapers  silent.  The  alliance  of  Russia 
and  Japan  fills  us  with  the  gravest  misgivings  about 
the  future  of  China.  The  time  is  not  far  distant 
when  duty  and  interest  may  impose  upon  us  inter- 
vention in  the  Far  East.  An  tmbridgeable  chasm 
between  the  Occidental  Powers  and  Germany  will 
lead  to  an  alliance  of  Germany  with  Russia  and  Japan 
to  dominate  Asia.  This  is  not  prophecy.  On  your 
chessboard,  you  can  point  out  moves  and  combina- 
tions of  moves  from  study  of  and  experience  in  other 
games.  You  cannot,  of  course,  foresee  what  move 
the  player  will  make.  But  you  can  tell  him  what 
will  happen  if  he  makes  the  move. 

The  surest  means  of  estabhshing  the  security  of 
Europe  against  Prussian  militarism  is  to  take  away 
from  the  reactionary  elements  in  Germany  the 
arguments  by  wliich  they  have  won  and  hold  the 
support  of  the  German  electorate.  A  regenerated, 
democratic  Germany,  cooperating  with  the  rest  of 
Europe  and  with  America  in  the  work  of  developing 
and  civilizing  the  world,  will  be  bom  out  of  this  war, 
if  internationalism,  instead  of  nationalism,  and  the 
higher  interests  of  humanity,  instead  of  the  particu- 
lar interests  of  the  strongest,  are  the  ruling  factors 
of  the  Peace  Conference. 

The  happiness  of  our  children,  in  a  world  where 
peace  and  harmony  reign,  depends  much  upon  the 
new  map  of  Africa. 


491 


INDEX 


Abbas  Hilmi,  Khedive  of  Egypt, 
399-400;  character  and  oppor- 
tunities, 421,  423;  deposed, 
424 

Abdul  Aziz,  Sultan  of  Morocco, 
362  et  seq.,  378  et  seq.;  agrees 
to  abdicate,  383 

Abyssinia,  96-105;  Italy  and, 
97,  99;  Emperor  Menclik, 
97,  99,  102,  103;  Dr.  Rosen 
Kaiser's  envoy  to,  99-100; 
German  and  Austrian  com- 
mercial treaties,  100;  French 
and  British  convention, 
lOO-ioi;  death  of  Emperor 
Menelik,  103;  civil  war  in, 
103;  future  of,  104 

Adovva,  battle  of,  1896,  4; 
defeat  at  crushing  blow  to 
Italian  colonial  aspirations 
in  East  Africa,  118 

Africa,  European  development 
of,  possible  only  with  increase 
of  transportation  facilities  and 
production,  31;  islands  of, 
31-42;  Boer  war  marks  a  step 
forward  in  making  it  a  white 
man's  country,  50-51;  colo- 
nial adventures  of  Italy  in, 
II5-129;  Spanish  colonics  in, 
115  n.;  Germany's  entrance 
into,  173-174;  stability  of 
European  institutions  in,  480 

African  problems  for  the  Peace 
Conference,  481-491 ;  will  Ger- 
many be  excluded  from  Africa 
at  end  of  European  War?, 
484-486;  considerations  in 
favor  of  giving  Germany  a 
part  in  development  of  Africa, 
486-490;  American  interest  in 
a  wise  settlement,  490-491 


Afrikander  Congress  at  Wor- 
cester, December,  1900,  44 

Agadir  incident,  388 

Albert,  King  of  Belgium,  visits 
Congo,  162 

Albert  Nyanza,  Lake,  unavail- 
able for  irrigating  the  Sudan, 
20 

Algeciras,  European  rivalry  in 
Morocco  before,  355-373; 
Conference  of  1906,  373,  374, 
et  seq. 

Algeria  and  Tunis,  the  nucleus 
of  the  French  African  Empire, 
130-146;  French  enter  Algeria 
in  1830,  132;  French  occu- 
pation of  Tunis  sanctioned, 
133;  Tunis  and  Morocco  the 
keys  to  France's  house  in 
Africa,  134  and  n.;  Tunis 
invaded,  134;  Algeria  con- 
quered during  reign  of  Louis 
Philippe,  135;  French  govern- 
ment of,  135  el  seq.;  Algeria 
did  not  prosper  till  inhabi- 
tants were  given  voice  in 
government,  137-138;  Alge- 
rian trade  with  France  and 
commercial  development,  138- 
139;  education  in  Algeria, 
139-140;  extension  of  Algerian 
territory,  141;  Tunis  invaded 
and  French  Protectorate  es- 
tablished, 141 ;  early  economic 
progress  of  Tunis,  142;  politi- 
cal advantages  to  French  of 
holding  Tunis,  143-144;  crux 
of  French  problem  in  northern 
Africa,  144-1  {6 

Ali,  Sultan,  of  Darfiir,  19  and  n. 

Anglo-French  agreement  of  1899, 
18;  of  1904,  18,  368,  369 


493 


INDEX 


Angola,    or    Portuguese  West 

Africa,  257-263 
Ashanti,  revolt  of,  282-283 
Atbara,  railway  to,  11 
Atbara  River,  bridge  over,  1 1 


Basutoland,  83 

Belgians  in  the  Congo,  147-172; 

see  also  Congo 
Bernard,     Colonel,  Financial 

Secretary  at  Khartum,  9-10 
Beyers,  General,  70;  a  leader  in 

rebellion    in    South  African 

Union,  454  el  seq.;  drowned, 

461 

Bismarck,  telegram  to  German 
Consul  at  Cape  Town,  1 74 

Boers,  result  of  the  Boer  War 
a  benefit  to,  50-51;  oppose 
introduction  of  Chinese  labor 
in  South  Africa,  61-62;  agi- 
tate for  responsible  govern- 
ment, 67-68;  demand  that 
Orange  Free  State  be  given 
responsible  government  at 
same  time  as  Transvaal,  69; 
determined  that  franchise 
shall  not  be  granted  to 
natives  and  coolies,  72;  con- 
flict over  use  of  Taal  in  South 
African  schools,  74-76;  opposed 
to  attacking  German  South- 
west Africa,  454;  potential 
rebels,  456;  form  most  of 
army  of  General  Smuts  which 
crushes  rebellion  in  South 
African  Union,  460;  attitude 
of,  towards  Great  Britain  and 
in  European  War,  463-464; 
in  conquest  of  German  vSouth- 
west  and  East  Africa  and  in 
overseas  contingents,  467- 
468 ;  see  also  Boer  War,  Trans- 
vaal, South  Africa,  and  Orange 
Free  State. 

Boer  War,  last  years  of,  43-49; 
British  disappointment  at  pro- 
longation of,  43;  Afril^ander 
Congress  denounces  British 
conduct  of,  44;  I'Vcnch  public 
opinion  hostile  to  Great  Brit- 


ain, 44;  Kaiser  Wilhelm's 
refusal  to  receive  President 
Kruger  checkmates  Boer 
hopes  of  aid  from  Europe,  44; 
martial  law  proclaimed  in 
Cape  Colony,  44;  Lord 
Kitchener's  proclamation  of 
August  7, 1901,  45;  concentra- 
tion camps,  46-47  and  n.; 
"National  Scouts"  in,  47-48; 
defeat  of  Lord  Alethuen  the 
last  Boer  victory,  48;  Boer 
independence  out  of  the  ques- 
tion, 48;  Vereeniging  Confer- 
ence, May  15,  1902,  48-49; 
terms  of  peace,  49-50;  British 
loss  in,  50;  result  of  war  a 
benefit  to  Boers  and  the  whole 
world,  50-51 

Botha,  General,  66,  70;  influence 
in  South  African  Union,  449 
ct  scq.;  aids  in  crushing  re- 
bellion in  South  African 
Union,  460 

British  in  East  Africa  and 
Uganda,  206-227 

British  East  Africa,  boundaries, 
206;  frontiers  established,  211; 
administration,  212;  pacifica- 
tion and  economic  develop- 
ment, 212-214;  native  dis- 
turbances, 2 1 4-2 1 5 ;  mission- 
ary work,  215-216;  white 
colonization,  217  seq.;  con- 
flict between  settlers  and 
chartered  company,  218  c/  seq.; 
opposition  to  Jews  and  Asiat- 
ics, 219-221;  to  limited  lease- 
hold of  land  grants,  221-223; 
to  favoritism  toward  natives, 
223-225;  to  government  with- 
out representation,  225-226; 
settlers  in  the  European  War, 
227 

British  West  Africa,  276-298; 
four  colonies  in,  276-277;  see 
Gambia,  Sierra  Leone,  Gold 
Coast  Colony,  and  Nigeria. 

Bu  Hamara,  revolt  of,  in 
Morocco,  366-369;  death  of, 
384  n. 


494 


INDEX 


Cairo,  convention  signed  Janu- 
ary 9,  1899,  at,  5-6 

Canary  Islands,  32 

Cape  Colony,  see  South  Africa 
and  South  African  Union 

Cape  to  Cairo  Railway,  196 

Cape  Verde  Islands,  252-253 

Casement,  Roger,  report  on  the 
Congo,  151-152 

Central  Africa,  see  Nyasaland 
and  Rhodesia 

Central  Africa,  French  in,  335- 
354 

Chad,  Lake,  environing  colonies, 
335 

Chad  Military  Region,  338,  340 
Chamberlain,  Joseph,  decides 
to  visit  South  Africa,  53;  his 
problems  and  action  there, 
53  et  seq.;  result  of  his  visit, 
57;  proposed  Transvaal  war 
"contribution,"  64-66;  pro- 
mise and  warning  to  Boers, 
67 

Chinese  labor  in  South  Africa, 
61-63 

Churchill,  Winston,  on  Uganda, 
207-208 

Concentration  camps,  in  Boer 
War,  46;  mortaUty  in,  46  and 
n. 

Congo,  the,  Belgians  in,  147- 
172;  Congo  Free  State  es- 
tablished, 147;  area  and 
boundaries,  147-148;  history 
for  first  ten  years  of  twentieth 
century  a  sad  and  revolting 
page  of  history,  149;  question 
of  Belgium's  fitness  for 
stewardship  of,  150  et  scq.; 
report  of  Mr.  Casement  on, 

151-  152;   Lord   Cromer  on, 

152-  153;  indignation  in  Bel- 
gium at  Casement  and 
Cromer  reports,  154;  Com- 
mission of  Inquiry  appointed, 
155;  its  report,  155-156;  King 
Leopold  cedes  Congo  Free 
State  to  Belgium,  157;  atti- 
tude of  Great  Britain  and 
Germany  towards  the  trans- 
fer, 158-159;  Belgian  promises 


not  believed  in  England,  160; 
death  of  King  Leopold  raises 
hopes  of  awakening  of  Belgian 
conscience,  162;  visit  of  King 
Albert  to  Congo,  162;  condi- 
tions improving,  163;  native 
right  to  land  ownership,  163- 
164;  railway  construction, 
165-167;  products  of,  168- 
169;  administration  and 
finance,  169-171;  future  of, 
in  connection  with  adjust- 
ments at  end  of  European 
War,  171-172 

Congo  Free  State,  see  Congo 

Congo,  French,  338 

Congo  River,  147  et  seq. 

Congress,  Afrikander,  44 

Conquest  of  German  African 
colonies,  470-480 

Cromer,  Lord,  2;  on  necessity 
to  Egj'pt  of  reclamation  of 
the  Sudan,  4;  financial  policy 
for  the  Sudan,  6-7;  points 
out  need  of  railway  from  Nile 
to  Red  Sea,  11 ;  on  slave  trade 
in  the  Sudan,  12;  on  Belgian 
misgovemment  of  Congo,  152- 
153;  in  Egypt,  397-398  et  seq.; 
native  judgment  of  his  ad- 
ministration, 408-409 

Cyrenaica,  Turkey  withdraws 
opposition  to  Italian  occupa- 
tion, 123;  Italian  progress  in, 
in  1913,  127 


Dahomey,  312,  313,  317-320 

De  Brazza,  M.,  investigation  of 
conditions  in  French  Congo 
territories,  343-345 

Delagoa  Bay,  failure  of  British 
effort  to  claim,  265 

Delaroy,  General,  defeats  Lord 
Merthuen  in  Boer  War,  48 

Demberg,  Dr.,  on  conditions  in 
German  East  Africa,  240 

Do  Wet,  urges  continuance  of 
Boer  War,  49;  leader  in  re- 
bellion in  South  African 
Union,  457  et  seq. 

Djibouti,  107 


INDEX 


Dulmadoba,  British  defeat  at, 
113 

East  Africa,  see  British  East 
Africa,  German  East  Africa, 
Portuguese  East  Africa 

Education  in  Algeria,  139-140 

Educational  facilities  in  the 
Sudan,  16-18 

Egypt,  necessity  to,  of  reclama- 
tion of  the  Sudan,  4;  conven- 
tion with  Great  Britain, 
January  19,  1899,  5-6;  loans 
to  the  Sudan,  8-9;  under  the 
last  of  the  Khedives,  391- 
420;  necessity  to  Great  Brit- 
ain of  control  of  Suez  Canal, 
393;  British  enter,  394;  inter- 
national status  of,  395;  real 
control  in  British  hands,  396; 
economic  progress,  398 ; 
"Young  Moslem,"  move- 
ment, 401;  Islamic  agitation, 
402;  Nationahst  propaganda, 
402  et  seq.,  410-413;  change  in 
Anglo-French  relations,  404- 
405;  Turkish  boundary  dis- 
pute, 406;  native  judgment  of 
Lord  Cromer's  administration, 
408-409;  Sir  Eldon  Gorst 
succeeds  Lord  Cromer  as 
Consul-General,  409;  Copts 
secede  from  NationaUsts,  412; 
Colonel   Roosevelt's  speech, 

413-  414;  action  of  the  Copts, 

414-  417;  death  of  Sir  Eldon 
Gorst,  418;  Lord  IGtchener 
succeeds  him,  418;  strength- 
ens Britain's  hold  in  Egypt, 
419-420;  character  and  oppor- 
tunities of  Khedive  Abbas 
Hilmi,  421-423;  Khedive  de- 
posed, 424 ; entrance  of  Turkey 
into  European  War  creates 
new  situation  in  Egj-pt,  425; 
troops  sent  to,  426;  made  a 
British  Protectorate,  42S; 
Turkish  attack  upon,  430; 
military  protection  strength- 
ened, 431-432;  value  of,  to 
Great  Britain,  432-433;  des- 
tiny of,  433;  dissatisfaction 


with  British  rule  in,  434-439; 

internal  government  the  real 

problem  in,  440 
Elgin,  Lord,  orders  suspension  of 

Chinese  labor  importation  in 

South  Africa,  69 
El  Obeid,  railway  extended  to, 

9,  12 
Eritrea,  119 

European  War,  outlook  in 
Sudan  at  opening  of,  24-25; 
Morocco  a  principal  cause  of, 
376-377;  African  problems  for 
the  Peace  Conference,  481- 
491;  issues  in,  and  neutral 
attitude  towards  combatants, 
482,  et  seq.;  American  interest 
in  a  wise  settlement  of,  490- 
491 

Fashoda,  Marchand  expedition 

to,  18 
Fashoda  incident,  336 
Fez  occupied  by  French,  385 
France,  and   Sudan  boundary 
disputes,      18-19;  African 
islands  of,  33 ;  efforts  to  secure 
Morocco,   358   et   seq.;  gets 
Morocco,    374-390;  occupa- 
tion of  Morocco  begins,  380- 
381;  negotiations  with  Spain 
and  Germany  over  Morocco, 
385  et  seq.;  Morocco  placed 
under  protection  of,  389 
French    African    Empire,  see 

Algeria  and  Tunis 
French  Equatorial  Africa,  338 
French  in  Central  Africa,  335- 
354;  distribution  of  territories 
in  Central  Africa,  335;  con- 
quests and  territorial  adjust- 
ments, 336-337;  Chad  AliU- 
tary  Region,  338,  340;  Gabim, 
338-339;  Middle  Congo  Col- 
ony,  338,  339;  Ubangi-Shari- 
Chad  Colony,  338,  339;  mal- 
administration of  Congo  terri- 
tories, 342  et  seq.;  abuses  of 
Concessionnaire  system,  343, 
et  seq.;  de  Brazza  investi- 
gating commission  and  its 
report,  343-345;  effect  of  reve- 


INDEX 


French  in  Central  Africa — Con'd. 
lations  of  de  Brazza  report, 
350;  effect  of  Central  Africa 
on  moral  sense  of  the  white 
man,  351-352;  qualities  neces- 
sary for  administrative  officers, 
352;  reasons  for  respective 
personnel  of  French  army  and 
colonial  service,  353.-354 

French  in  West  Africa  and 
the  Sahara,  312-334;  Gabun, 
312,  313;  Dahomey,  312,  313, 
3i7-32o;Guinea,3i2,3i3,3i4; 
Ivory  Coast,  312,  313,  314- 
316,  319;  Senegal,  312,  313, 
322;  Senegambia,  313,  324; 
the  "open  door"  principle 
and  German  effort  to  gain 
commerce  of  French  colonies, 
319-321;  cotton  culture,  322; 
economic  difficulties  and  terri- 
torial adjustments,  323;  Sene- 
gal-Niger Colony,  324-325; 
British  and  German  colonies 
disturb  the  continuity  of 
French  territory  and  influence, 
325-327;  colonizing  difficul- 
ties, 327-328;  economic 
progress,  328-329;  West 
Africa  a  training  school  for 
army  officers  and  a  reser- 
voir of  troops,  329-330;  fron- 
tiers delimited,  330;  pacifica- 
tion of  the  Sahara,  331-332; 
economic  and  labor  problems, 
332-334 

Gabun,  312,  313,  338-339 

Gambia,  276-277 

Garstin,  Sir  William,  and  irriga- 
tion in  the  Sudan,  20-21 

German  African  colonics,  con- 
quest of,  470-480 

German  East  Africa,  228-243; 
most  important  of  German 
colonies,  228-229;  boundaries, 

229-  230;  German  East 
Africa  Company  and  de- 
velopment of  its  territories, 

230-  231;  German  colonial 
expansion  in  Central  Africa 
prevented,   232;   claim  that 

33 


Germany  acquired  African 
colonies  hy  trickery  un- 
founded, 232-233 ;  German 
pioneers  in  East  Africa 
discouraged  at  home,  234 
et  seq.;  railway  development, 
234-237;  administrative  or- 
ganization of  the  colony 
started,  237;  rigid  bureau- 
cracy a  handicap,  238;  Ger- 
man idea  of  treatment  of 
Mohammedanism,  238-240 ; 
Dr.  Demberg  on  conditions  in, 
240;  increase  in  trade,  241; 
German  public  opinion  cham- 
pions cause  of  natives,  241- 
242;  abolition  of  serfdom 
demanded,  242;  resistance  of 
colony  to  British  invasion, 
243;  conquest  of,  476-479 
German  East  Africa  Company, 
231 

German  Southwest  Africa,  173- 
188;  boundaries,  173;  entrance 
of  Germany  into  Africa,  173- 
174;  German  method  of 
colonization,  174-175;  Ger- 
man development  hampered 
by  British  possession  of  Wal- 
fisch  Bay,  176;  agriculture 
difficult,  176;  Land  Bank 
established,  177;  metals  in, 
178;  diamond  fields,  178-180; 
German  administrative  and 
colonization  plans,  180-182; 
native  uprisings,  183-185; 
transformation  effected  by 
war,  186;  increase  of  colonists, 
186;  crisis  of  19 10,  1 87;  con- 
quered by  the  South  African 
Commonwealth  army  in  1915, 
1 88,  475-476 

German  West  Africa,  299-311; 
see  Togoland,  Kamerun 

Germans  in  Africa,  hopeless 
situation  of,  at  opening  of 
European  War,  470;  treat- 
ment of,  in  British,  French, 
and  other  colonies,  470  et  seq. 

Germany,  and  the  Congo  ques- 
tion, 158  ft  seq.;  Rhodes 
believes  harmony  with,  esscn- 


497 


INDEX 


Germany —  Con  tin  ued. 

tial  to  Great  Britain's  peace 
and  to  accomplishment  of 
plans  in  Africa,  246-248; 
unpublished  treaty  with  Great 
Britain  in  1898,  regarding 
Africa,  247;  and  Great  Brit- 
ain drift  apart,  248;  declares 
war  on  Portugal,  275;  working 
against  France  in  Morocco, 
356  et  seq.;  intervention  in 
Morocco,  372 ;  negotiations 
with  France  as  to  Morocco, 
385  et  seq. 

Gladstone,  Lord  Herbert,  first 
Governor  of  South  African 
Union,  443  et  seq. 

Gold  Coast  Colony  (British), 
276;  Ashanti  revolt,  282-283; 
Northern  Territories  added 
to,  283;  valuable  market  for 
British  trade,  284;  mining 
wealth,  284-285;  Togoland 
conquered,  285 

Gordon  College,  14-15 

Gorst,  Sir  Eldon,  report  for  1909, 
23-24;  Consul-General  of 
Egypt,  409;  death  of,  418 

Great  Britain,  in  the  Sudan,  i- 
30;  drops  the  Sudan,  i; 
vision  of  reconquest  of  the 
Sudan,  2;  problems  of  colonial 
administrators,  2-3;  im- 
possibility of  direct  protec- 
torate over  Sudan,  4-5;  con- 
vention with  Egypt  regarding 
Sudan,  January  19,  1899,  5-6; 
guarantees  interest  on  loan 
for  Sudan,  9;  and  Sudan 
boundaries,  18-19;  African 
islands  of,  32-33;  dictates 
terms  of  peace  at  end  of  Boer 
War,  49;  loss  in  Boer  War,  50; 
policy  in  Somaliland,  106- 
114;  and  the  Congo  question, 
151  et  seq.;  Portugal  in  vassal- 
age to,  244-245;  Rhodes  sees 
peace  and  prosperity  for,  and 
accomplishment  of  African 
plans,  only  in  harmony  with 
Germany,  246-247;  unpub- 
lished treaty  with  Germany  in 


1898  regarding  Africa,  247; 
and  Germany  drift  apart,  248; 
agreement  with  France  in 
1904,  248;  agreement  with 
Russia  in  1907,248;  alarm  in, 
over  possibihty  of  Germany 
getting  coaling  stations  and 
naval  bases  in  Portuguese 
colonies,  249-250;  willing  to 
fight  to  maintain  her  world 
supremacy,  251;  working 
against  France  in  Morocco, 
356  et  seq.;  enters  Egypt,  394; 
holds  real  control  of  Egj-pt, 
396;  economic  progress  of 
Egypt  under,  398;  deposes 
Khedive  of  Egypt,  424;  makes 
Egypt  a  British  Protectorate, 
428;  South  African  Union 
most  remarkable  achievement 
of  British  statesmanship,  444; 
see  also  under  names  of 
British  African  colonies. 

Grey,  Sir  Edward,  and  affairs  of 
the  Congo,  158,  160 

Guinea,  253-254 

Guinea  (French),  312,  313,  314 

Hafid,  Sultan  of  Morocco,  nego- 
tiations with  France,  383  et 
seq.;  signs  treaty  with  France, 
389 

Hertzog,  General,  head  of  ex- 
treme Boer  party  in  South 
Africa,  450  et  seq. 

Het  Volk,  Boer  political  party, 
70-71 

Het  Volk,  Pretoria  newspaper, 
70  n. 

Hobbhouse,  Miss,  on  concen- 
tration camps,  46 

Hohenlohe,  Prince,  on  treatment 
of  Mohammedanism,  238-239 

Hussein  Kamel,  becomes  Sultan 
of  Egypt,  428;  on  destiny  of 
Egypt,  433 

Ignorance  of  uncivilized  peoples, 
13  n. 

Indian  colonist  rights  and  In- 
dian immigration  in  South 
Africa,  63-64 


498 


INDEX 


Irrigation  in  the  Sudan,  20-21 

Islands  of  Africa,  31-42 
Italy  and  Abyssinia,  97,  99 
Italy,  colonial  adventures  of,  in 
Africa,  1 15-129;  Risorgimenlo 
literature  of,  116;  Italians 
settle  in  northern  Africa,  116; 
occupy  strip  of  Red  Sea  coast 
and  enter  Somaliland,  117- 
118;  battle  of  Adowa,  1896, 
118;  concentrates  attention  in 
Tripoli,  120;  annexes  African 
province  of  Turkey,  123;  war 
with  Turkey,  124;  treaty  of 
Ouchy,  125;  progress  in  Cyre- 
naica  in  1913,  127;  value  of 
Tripoli,  127-128;  repercus- 
sion of  European  War  proves 
that  Italy  had  not  conquered 
Tripoli,  129 
Ivory  Coast  Colony  (French), 
312,  313,  314-316,  319 

Jameson,  Dr.,  leader  of  Im- 
perialist or  Progressive  Oppo- 
sition in  South  Africa,  53; 
effect  of  his  policy  on  success 
of  South  African  Union,  451 

Kaiser  Wilhelm,  see  Wilhelm  II. 

Kamerun  (German  colony), 
boundaries  of,  299-300; 
acquired  by  Germany,  304; 
extension  of  colony,  305-306; 
products,  306;  maladminis- 
tration, 307-308 ;  railway  and 
telegraphic  communication, 
310;  education  in,  311;  con- 
quest of,  476-477 

Khalifa,  escapes  from  Omdur- 
man,  21 ;  killed,  21 

Khartum,  railway  connection 
with,  11;  King's  Day  at,  27 

Kitchener,  Lord,  2,  4,  6,  11; 
opens  Gordon  College,  14; 
proclamation  of  August^  7, 
1901,  45;  declines  to  consider 
proposals  of  Vereeniging  Con- 
ference, 48;  leaves  South 
Africa,  50;  Consul-Gcncral  in 
Egypt,  418 


Kruger,  President,  reception  in 
Paris,  44;  Kaiser  Wilhelm 
refuses  to  receive,  44 

Labor  problems  in  South  Africa, 
58-63 

Ladysmith,  relief  of,  43 

Leopold  II.  of  Belgium  and 
Congo  Free  State,  147,  150, 
151,  155.  156,  157,  159;  death 
of,  1909,  162 

Liberia,  93-96 

Livingstone,  David,  explorer, 
and  Central  Africa,  189-190 

Lorenzo  Marques,  and  contro- 
versy over  Transvaal  traffic, 
78-82 

Madagascar,  history  and  de- 
velopment of,  38-42 

Mafeking,  relief  of,  43 

Mahdism  in  the  Sudan,  21-24 

Manning,  Sir  William,  report  on 
Somaliland,  1 1 1 

Marchand  expedition,  18 

Mauritania,  313,  324 

Menelik,  Emperor  of  Abyssinia, 
97,  99,  102,  103 

Methuen,  Lord,  defeated  and 
taken  prisoner  in  Boer  War, 
48 

^Icux,  Lady,  will  of,  102  n. 

Middle  Congo  Colony,  338,  339 

Milncr,  Lord,  47;  declines  to 
consider  proposal  of  Vereen- 
iging Conference,  48;  becomes 
Governor  of  Transvaal,  50; 
proposition  to  solve  political 
problems  in  South  Africa,  54; 
opposes  Transvaal  war  "con- 
tribution," 66;  prosperity  of 
Transvaal  largely  due  to,  91; 
advocates  idea  of  imperial 
unity  in  South  Africa,  442 

Mohammedanism,  German  idea 
of  treatment  of,  238-240 

Morocco,  one  of  keys  to  France's 
house  in  Africa,  134  and  n.; 
Euroiican  rivalry  in,  before 
Algeciras,  355-3731  influence 
of  Moroccan  affairs  on  world 
war,  355;  French  efforts  to 


499 


INDEX 


Morocco — Continued. 

secure,  358  ct  seq.;  crisis  in, 
begins  in  1901,  362;  revolt  of 
Bu  Hamara,  366  et  seq.;  Anglo- 
French  Agreement  of  1904, 
368,  369;  first  German  inter- 
vention in,  372;  Conference  of 
Algeciras  arranged,  373;  Act 
of  Conference  futile,  374  et 
seq.;  acquired  by  France, 
374-390;  a  principal  cause  of 
the  European  War,  376-377; 
French  occupation  begins, 
380-381 ;  Abdul  Aziz  ab- 
dicates, 383;  tactics  of  Sultan 
Hafid,  3S3  et  seq.;  French 
occupy  Fez,  385 ;  independence 
over,  385;  French  negotia- 
tions with  Spain  and  Germany, 
385  et  seq.;  treaty  signed 
placing  the  country  under 
French  protection,  389;  paci- 
fication of,  389-390 

Mullah  Mohammed  Abdullah, 
rise  of  power  of,  in  Somaliland, 
109;  British  policy  regarding, 
110;  again  becomes  active, 
me/  seq. 

Mustafa  Kamel  and  Nationalist 
agitation  in  Egypt,  402  et  seq. 

Nadji  Bey,  123-124 

Natal,  the  problem  of,  82-89; 

see   also   South   Africa  and 

South  African  Union 
National  Scouts,  hostility  to, 

54-55 

Niger,  see  Senegal-Niger  Colony 
Nigeria,  boundaries,  276-277; 
made  a  separate  colony  in 
1886,  286;  administrative 
changes  in,  286-287;  popula- 
tion and  area,  287;  agitation 
against  liquor  traffic  in,  288- 
290;  conquest  of  hinterland; 
290-294;  cotton-growing  ex- 
perimentation, 295-296,  his- 
tory of,  indicates  the  secret 
of  British  success  in  African 
colonization,  296-298 
Northern  Territories  added  to 
Gold  Coast  Colony,  283 


Nyasaland,  189-195;  boundaries, 
191;  population,  192;  re- 
cruiting of  natives  for  work 
outside  the  Protectorate  pro- 
hibited, 192-193;  native 
antagonism,  193;  spread  of 
Alohammedanism,  194-195 

Omdurman,  battle  of,  2 ;  Khalifa 
escapes  from,  21;  celebration 
of  the  Prophet's  birthday  in, 
27-30 

Orange  Free  State,  annexed  to 
British  Empire,  45;  constitu- 
tion granted  to,  71;  elections 
in,  71 ;  rebellion  in,  457  et  seq.; 
see  also  South  Africa,  South 
African  Union,  and  Boer  War 

Ottoman  Empire,  British  for- 
eign policy  in  middle  of  nine- 
teenth century  built  on  its 
maintenance,  392 

Ouchy,  treaty  of,  125 

Peters,  Dr.,  and  development  of 
German  East  Africa,  2^0  et  seq. 

Portugal,  national  debt  of,  271; 
anti-colonial  policy  of  radicals, 
272;  attitude  in  European 
War,  274-275;  Germany  de- 
clares war  on,  275 

Portuguese  colonies  in  Africa, 
244-275;  Portugal  in  vassal- 
age to  England,  '244-245; 
deHmitation  of  Portuguese 
possessions  by  other  coloniz- 
ing Powers,  244-251;  increase 
of  German  trade  in,  249; 
Great  Britain  alarmed  at 
possibility  of  Germany  getting 
coaling  stations  and  naval 
bases  in,  249-250;  extent  of, 
251;  enumeration  of,  252; 
Cape  Verde  Islands,  252-253; 
Guinea,  253-254;  Sao  Thom6, 
and  Principe,  254-257;  Por- 
tuguese West  Africa,  or 
Angola,  257-263;  Portuguese 
East  Africa,  263-271  {see 
Portuguese  East  Africa) ; 
nature  of  Portuguese  colonial 
administration,  271;  colonics 
a  question  of  international 


500 


INDEX 


Portuguese  colonies — Continued. 
importance,  273-274;  pros- 
pect of  retention  of,  275 

Portuguese  East  Africa,  263- 
271;  geographical  position, 
263;  importance  of  possession 
by  Portugal  to  Great  Britain 
and  France,  263-264;  failure 
of  British  attempt  to  claim 
Delagoa  Bay,  265;  trade  ri- 
valries, 266-267;  problem  of, 
267-269;  chartered  companies, 

269-  270;  revenues  parasitical, 

270-  271 

Portuguese    West    Africa,  or 

Angola,  257-263 
Principe,  254-257 

Railways  in  Sudan,  8,  9,  11,  12 
Rand,  the,  55 

Rebellion  in  South  African 
Union,  454-469 

Rhodes,  Cecil,  and  South  Cen- 
tral Africa,  1 89-191;  and 
South  African  Company,  195; 
Boer  War  essential  to  accom- 
plishment of  his  plans,  197; 
divergent  British  and  Boer 
opinion  of,  197  n. ;  saw  peace  for 
Great  Britain  and  realization 
of  his  African  plans  only  in 
harmony  with  Germany,  246- 
248;  effort  to  accomplish 
this,  247-248 

Rhodesia,  boundaries,  191;  be- 
ginning of  development  of, 
195;  environing  states  and 
their  relation  to  railway  and 
other  development,  195-198; 
agitation  for  expropriation  of 
Chartered  Company,  199- 
202;  land  problem,  200,  201 
and  n. ;  development  of  South- 
em  Rhodesia,  203;  efforts  to 
attract  immigration,  203; 
rapid  development  of  North- 
em  Rhodesia  since  1910,  204; 
stays  out  of  South  African 
Union,  442 

Risor/^imcnlo  literature  of  Italy, 
116 

Roberts,  Lord,  43,  44 


Sahara,  French  in,  324,  325, 

331-332  / 

Sao  Thomd,  254-257 

Selborne,  Lord,  High  Com- 
missioner in  South  Africa,  90 

Senegal,  312,  313,  322 

Senegal-Niger  Colony,  324-325 

Senegambia,  313,  324 

Sierra  Leone,  276,  282;  revenue, 
278;  hut  tax  causes  revolts, 
278;  secret  cannibalistic  socie- 
ties, 279-280 

Slave  trade  in  Sudan,  12-13 

Slavery,  in  Zanzibar,  36-38; 
abolished  by  French  in  Mada- 
gascar, 40;  defunct  in  Egypt, 
398 

Sleeping  sickness,  208-209 

Smuts,  General,  supports  Gen- 
eral Botha  in  South  African 
Union,  449  et  seq.;  aids  in 
crushing  rebellion,  460 

Somaliland,  British  policy  in, 
106-114;  location  and  popula- 
tion, 106;  Anglo-French  ac- 
cord of  1904,  107;  French 
Somaliland,  107;  Italian 
Somaliland,  108;  geographical 
position  of  British  Somaliland, 
108;  rise  of  power  of  Mullah 
Mohammed  Abdullah  in,  109; 
policy  regarding  Mullah  laid 
down,  no;  Mullah  again 
becomes  active,  ill  el  seq.; 
British  withdraw  from  interior 
posts,  in;  Sir  William  Man- 
ning'j  report.  III;  discussion  in 
British  Parliament  and  press, 
I12-113;  British  defeat  at 
Dulmadoba,  113;  dervishes 
still  on  the  offensive  in  Novem- 
ber, 1914,  114 

South  Africa,  last  years  of  Boer 
War  and  reconstruction  pe- 
riod, 43-91 ;  evolution  in,  since 
1900,  52;  Mr.  Chamberlain 
decides  to  visit,  53;  labor 
problem,  53;  other  problems 
to  be  settled,  54  el  seq.;  hos- 
tility to  National  Scouts  in, 
54-55;  result  of  Mr.  Cliamber- 
lain's  visit  to,  57;  the  mines 


INDEX 


South  Africa — Continued. 

and  the  problem  of  white, 
black,  and  Chinese  labor,  58- 
63;  Indian  colonist  rights  and 
Indian  immigration,  63-64 ; 
the  Transvaal  war  "contribu- 
tion," 64-66;  granting  re- 
sponsible government  to  the 
Transvaal  and  Orange  Free 
State,  67-72 ;  the  Taal  against 
English  in  the  schools,  72-76; 
conflicting  local  interests  of 
contiguous  colonies  under  the 
same  flag  hasten  union,  77-82 ; 
the  problem  of  Natal,  82-89 

South  African  Commonwealth, 
army  conquers  German  South- 
west Africa,  188 

South  African  Company,  begins 
development  of  Rhodesia,  195; 
charter  extended,  200 

South  African  Republic  an- 
nexed to  British  Empire,  45 

South  African  Union,  441-453; 
Colonial  Convention,  442; 
Union  formed  by  royal  pro- 
clamation, December  2,  1909, 
443;  government  ownership  of 
railways  in,  444-446;  negro 
question  in,  446-448;  war 
between   capital   and  labor, 

448-  449;  Boers  form  a  major- 
ity of  electorate  in,  449;  politi- 
cal parties  and  movements  in, 

449-  453;  rebellion  in,  454-469; 
martial  law  proclaimed,  456; 
manifesto  of  rebels,  458-460; 
Generals  Botha  and  Smuts 
crush  rebellion,  460;  causes 
of  rebellion  and  attitude  of 
Boers,  461  et  seq.;  racial 
animosity  strong,  466;  Boers 
in  conquest  of  German  South- 
west and  East  Africa  and  in 
overseas  contingents,  467-468; 
anti-British  feeling  still  strong, 
468-469 

Southwest  Africa,  see  German 

Southwest  Africa. 
Spain,  interests  in  Morocco  and 

negotiations  with  France,  385 

et  seq. 


Spanish  colonies  in  Africa,  1 15  n. 

State  ownership  of  public  utili- 
ties, in  the  Sudan,  8  n.;  in 
South  African  Union,  444-446 

Suakim  abandoned  as  railway 
terminus,  11 

Sudan,  the.  Great  Britain  in, 

I-  30;  dropped  by  Great 
Britain,  i;  battle  of  Omdur- 
man  made  possible  reconquest 
of,  2;  British  vision  of  recon- 
quest of,  2;  Great  Britain's 
problems  in,  2-3;  necessity  to 
Egypt  of  reclamation  of,  4; 
impossibility  of  direct  British 
Protectorate  over,  4-5;  con- 
vention of  British  and  Egyp- 
tian governments,  January 
19,  1899,  5-6;  exact  status  not 
yet  determined,  6;  financial 
policy  for,  6-7;  cost  of  recon- 
quest, 7;  public  works,  8-9; 
State  ownersliip  of  public 
utilities,  8  n.;  commercial 
development,  9;  railways  in, 

II-  12;  extent  of  territory,  12; 
slave  trade,  12-13;  Gordon 
College,  14-15;  educational 
facihties,  16-18;  boundary 
adjustments,  18-19;  irriga- 
tion problem,  29-21;  Sir  Regi- 
nald Wingate's  administra- 
tion of,  21-30;  population, 
23  n.;  outlook  at  opening  of 
European  War  in  1914,  24- 
25;  only  one  revolt  against 
the  Government,  25-26; 
King's  Day  in  Khartum,  27; 
celebration  of  the  Prophet's 
birthday  at  Omdurman,  27-30 

Sudan  Book  of  Loyally,  The,  25 
Sudanese,  characteristics  of,  26 
Sudan,  Port,  railway  terminus 

on  Red  Sea,  9,  11 
Suez  Canal,  393  et  seq. 
Swaziland,  83 

Taal,  the,  against  English  in 
South  African  schools,  72-76 

Tana,  Lake,  advantages  for 
irrigation  of  the  Sudan,  20-21 

Tangier,  French  increase  troops 


502 


INDEX 


Tangier — Continued 

at,  371;  visit  of  Kaiser  Wil- 
helm  to,  372 

Togoland  (German  colony) ,  con- 
quered by  Gold  Coast  forces 
and  French,  285;  boundaries 
of,  299;  acquirement  of,  by 
Germany,  300;  development 
of,  301-303;  cotton  growing 
in,  309;  railway  and  tele- 
graphic communication,  310; 
education  in,  31 1 ;  conquest  of, 
472-473 

Transvaal,  proposed  war  "con- 
tribution," 64-65;  Great 
Britain  decides  to  forego  the 
"contribution,"  66;  respons- 
ible government  granted  to, 
71;  first  elections  in,  71; 
prosperity  of,  largely  due  to 
Lord  Milner,  91;  rebellion  in, 
457  et  seq.;  see  also  South 
Africa,  South  African  Union, 
and  Boer  War. 

Treaty  of  Vereeniging,  see  Ver- 
eeniging  Conference. 

Tripoli,  Italy  concentrates  atten- 
tion in,  120;  lost  to  Ottoman 
Empire,  121;  rivalry  of  Euro- 
pean nations  and  Turkey 
regarding,  121  et  seq.;  Italo- 
Turkish  War  mostly  confined 
to,  124;  value  of,  127-128; 
repercussion  of  European  War 
proves  that  Italy  had  not 
conquered,  129 

Tuarcgs,  331 

Tunis,  one  of  keys  to  France's 
houseinAfrica,i34  and  n.;  141- 
144;  see  also  Algeria  and  Tunis. 

Turkey,  ambitions  regarding 
Sudan  and  Tripoli,  121  et  seq.; 
war  with  Italy,  124;  treaty  of 
Ouchy,  125;  impotence  to 
resist  Italy's  occupation  of 
Tripoli,  125 

Turks,  feelings  towards  the 
various  European  nationali- 
ties, 126 

Ubangi-Shari-Chad  Colony,  338, 
339 


Uganda,  British  Protectorate 
declared,  206;  importance  of, 
207,  208;  sleeping  sickness, 
208;  progress  of  Christianity 
in,  209-210;  agricultural  de- 
velopment, 210 

Union,  South  African,  South 
African  Union. 

United  States,  and  Liberia,  93, 
95;  interest  in  a  wise  and  politic 
settlement  of  European  War, 
490-491 

Vereeniging,  Conference  at,  48; 
proposals  of,  declined,  48; 
accepts  terms  of  peace  for 
ending  of  Boer  War,  49 

Victoria,  Queen,  44 

Victoria  Nyanza,  Lake,  rejected 
for  irrigating  the  Sudan,  20 

Vilonel,  General,  47 

Von  Trotha  tries  to  "stamp  out" 
rebellion  in  German  South- 
west Africa,  1 84 

Wady  Haifa,  railway  to  Atbara, 
II 

Walfisch  Bay,  possession  of,  by 
British  hampers  German  de- 
velopment in  Southwest 
Africa,  176 

Wellcome  Laboratories,  15 

West  Africa  and  the  Sahara, 
French  in,  312-334;  see  also 
British,  German,  and  Portu- 
guese West  Africa. 

Wilhelm  II.,  Kaiser,  refuses  to 
receive  President  Kruger,  44; 
visit  to  Tangier,  372 

Wingate,  Sir  Reginald,  6; 
on  Lord  Kitchener,  14  n.; 
anticipates  threatened  attack 
of  Sultan  Ali,  19  n.;  his  ad- 
ministration of  the  Sudan,  21- 
30 

"Young  Egypt"  party,  23 

"  Young  Moslems"  in  Egyjjt,  401 

"Young  Turks,"  122  et  seq. 

Zanzibar,  history  and  develop- 
ment of,  34-38 
Ziilnland,  84  el  seq. 


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